


Battle for Amarium

by ventrus_kyarn



Category: Mass Effect Trilogy, Mass Effect: Andromeda
Genre: Action/Adventure, Drama & Romance, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Fluff and Humor, Gen, Interspecies Romance, POV Original Character, Post-Mass Effect Andromeda, Turians (Mass Effect)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-20
Updated: 2020-12-23
Packaged: 2021-03-10 23:21:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 12
Words: 48,076
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28195365
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ventrus_kyarn/pseuds/ventrus_kyarn
Summary: After some problems communicating with the home planet of Amarium, Xindrait Ambassador K'yarneth and his partner Ventrus Kovarik decide to investigate the problem at the source. But once they arrive at the planet, they realize that the problem is much more severe than anyone could've originally thought.





	1. Leaving Andromeda

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first big project that I started in June 2020! I highly recommend that before reading this, you check out my Toyhouse to get some information on the xindraits! They're an original species I made and so it'd help if you knew some stuff about them, their culture, and government!
> 
> https://toyhou.se/~literature/50162.amarium-and-the-xindraits

I woke up to the soft buzzing of my specialized Omni-Tool. Since the xindraits can’t exactly see, the scientists of the Initiative were gracious enough to develop an OT for us that worked with frequencies instead of requiring an actual physical touch, much like how the ship we arrived here with operated. But according to Ventrus, it still has the same orange projection when I use it which he found interesting enough to examine…or he just wanted the excuse to hold my arm before we had officially started dating.

Ventrus was laying against my chest on the right side of my body, so checking the OT on my left was easy enough without disturbing him. It was a message from my assistants at the Embassy- something about an ‘emergency’ that needed my attention as soon as possible. I slowly slid out of the bed, letting Venti’s arms rest on the bed so he would hopefully stay asleep a little longer on his day off.

I headed over to the closet to change into more Ambassador-worthy clothing, which tended to just be variations of robes for my people since it’s easier to manage than a fullbody suit when almost everyone in your species has a different body type. Nevertheless, I must say I can wear one better than most others, or at least that’s what Venti says but I feel as though he’s slightly biased.

I put on my usual blue and white robes that the Andromeda Initiative graciously gifted me when I became the Ambassador. As I finished adjusting some of the straps, I heard the soft purr of my turian companion waking up with a stretch. Sure enough, looking behind me and towards the bed, I could see him rubbing his eyes and sitting up.

“Go back to sleep, Ventrus,” I laughed, walking over to him to give him a small kiss on the forehead.

“Where are you going,” he asked, holding onto my hand once I was close enough to him.

“Just to the Embassy, one of the assistants said there was something I needed to see- probably just some reports they don’t have access to or something, I’m sure it’ll be quick.”

“You’re just gonna leave me all alone in bed on my first day off since we beat the kett? How rude of you,” he mocked, that usual tone of sarcastic humor behind his voice.

“I’ll be back soon, I promise. In the meantime,” I paused to playfully push him back into bed by his chest. “You need to brush your pointy little teeth, that turian morning breath is deadly.”

He laughed at me before rolling back over on the bed and tucking a pillow under his head, “Yeah, yeah, just get back soon. I didn’t get us a king-size bed to sleep alone like a peasant.”

“Whatever you say, ‘King Ventrus’.”

With that, I stroked the side of his face and gave him another kiss before heading out the door. On my way to the Embassy, it was more than easy to hear the attempted hushed whispers of some of the other species in the halls of the Nexus. I find it odd that, even though they’ve all seen so many other species before, some are still scared of me and my own species because of my appearance. Sure, I know a new species that literally came to be from genetic mutation can sound a little odd, especially since they all know the kett existed to manipulate genetics and I’m positive that some of those ill-feelings rubbed off on the next new species they met, but it doesn’t make me feel any less unwanted by certain people on the ship. Nevertheless, as long as I can keep anyone from stirring any trouble with my people, then I know I’m at least doing my job properly despite less than perfect work conditions. It’s not like I’m not used to it anyway, I don’t think any other species I’ve personally encountered in the past few hundred years has been overly friendly with us on the first contact…except for Ventrus, of course. He and the Pathfinder came up with a term for it: Space Racists.

Regardless of the minority’s opinions, I could at least guarantee that I and my people were safe aboard the Nexus. So I was always able to get to my office easily, today included. Walking through the door, I was immediately greeted by my assistants who ushered me to my office in a hurry. I took my seat as they gathered in front of my desk, then Assistant Ishara fiddled with her OT before a message began to play. I couldn’t understand most of the message as it was mostly static and hums instead of anything that could even be considered words. The only words I could understand from it were “Amarium”, “attack”, and something that sounded like a horrific shriek, unlike anything I’d ever heard before.

I leaned forward in my seat, tapping the desk as the rest of my team looked at me for some sort of response.

Assistant Rinez was the first to speak, “We should go back to Amarium and investigate, yes? We can’t just assume everything is fine when we get a message like that!”

“Have you tried responding to them yet,” I asked them while I attempted to tune my OT in to our planet’s comm system.

“Of course we have! We’d been trying for an hour or so before we even called you.”

I stood from my chair slowly, clearing my throat and placing my hands behind my back before speaking, “I shall go to Amarium myself. The three of you are to stay here and keep the peace in my absence.”

Immediately, Assistant Ginntex stood forward to question me, “Why just you? You need some sort of escort to make sure you-”

“I’ll be fine,” I cut him off abruptly. “It is my hope that I will be back before the week is over. I’ll be checking in on the planet and dropping off these reports personally, then come back.”

“But…what if things aren’t alright there? What if something seriously wrong happened?”

“If something seriously wrong happened, we would’ve been told about it on a clear channel, not one that sounds like it’s being muffled through a pillow.” The assistants stood in silence, knowing they weren’t about to change my mind. “Please do contact Director Tann and alert him of my impending leave, I’ll be heading back to my room to prepare for the trip.”

My team knew that my decision was final, either that or they knew their place well enough to not question me over something like this. They cleared out of my office quietly before I walked out myself to the main deck of the Nexus. What could be wrong on Amarium? We haven’t had any problems in literal centuries!

Back in my room, Ventrus was still trying to sleep in the bed. He rolled over to look at me and held his arms out to invite me back into bed.

“I have to pack, Ventrus,” I groaned, realizing I couldn’t slip back into bed now. “There’s some sort of problem on Amarium that I need to check out.”

Ventrus jumped out of bed, “What’s wrong? Is it anything serious?” I could hear the worry in his voice as he came up and held onto my hands.

“Everything should be fine, probably just some communicator problems going on. It should just be a couple of days at most.”

“Well…then I’m coming with you!”

I laughed to myself before realizing he was serious, that determined look spreading across his face as he tightened his grip on me in thought, “It’s your day off, you need to stay here and relax, not worry about me and my planet.”

“Hey, it’s not much of a day off if I’m just gonna be bored and tinkering with the room all day, now is it? At least if I come with you I won’t have to be alone like some creep.”

I groaned, looking down at his pleading face, “You’re not gonna let this go, are you?”

“I’ll keep asking you for the next century if I have to, I’m young enough to do it.”

“Yes, and you’ll finish just in time to be bed-ridden for the last decade of your life.”

“Well then, guess you better just let me come then, right?”

Smiling, I leaned my head down to kiss his forehead before lightly pushing him off of me, “Fine then, go take a shower, I don’t wanna be stuck in a ship with a turian that smells like-”

“Like pure Heaven, the only thing that reeks is your attitude, Mr. Ambassador.”

“Maybe I’ll just leave while you’re in the shower.”

“I would never forgive you, your kneecaps would be forfeit, Xindrait Scum,” he laughed before rushing into the bathroom, the door automatically closing behind him.

I started off by making the bed- that man tosses and turns like a wild Fiend when he’s in the bed alone, which explains why he uses that as an excuse to latch onto me every night.

Afterward, I pulled out a bag from the closet and set it down on the bed. While he was great with weapons and armor, Venti would not understand how to properly plan and pack for a trip if it were included in his training pamphlets. So instead I decided to do the packing for us; we shouldn’t be gone for more than a day so I grabbed a single change or robes for myself as well as one of Venti’s fancier suits. I figure that once we get there, we can clear up whatever problems are going on and then maybe get a chance to explore the planet a bit, maybe even check on my family since we’ve both been wanting him to meet them for a while now.

Next, I went over to my end table to pack a few smaller things like my actual identification chip so that I can confirm who I am before reentering Amarium. When your whole race can’t see, you have to have some special ways of making sure you are who you say you are, which usually just means electronic and scanning our actual genes which is fine, but hopefully, they don’t get too picky on why I’ll have another alien in the ship with me.

Shuffling through the drawer some more, I felt the fabric of a holster that I had almost forgotten about. I pulled it up from the drawer to get a better look at it and it reaffirmed me of what it was: the old Scorpion pistol Ventrus had made me after our mission on the kett warship. He never liked the idea of me having to fight, I think mainly because it made him feel like he wasn’t trying hard enough. But after the mission on the warship, he started being more open about it which was more than welcome. He spent a few days tinkering around in his room before giving the actual gun to me, saying he had to customize it a bit so I could use it in my normal form and he said that he wanted to give it a little more kick since my body could handle it- probably why he calls it a hand canon now. I never had the chance to actually use it which has made him happy as can be, but something about what’s going on with Amarium… I got a feeling in my gut that I happened to graze my fingers across for reasons more than pure chance.

I stood up and parted my robes in the front to attach the holster to my waist since Ventrus has made it customed to fit me, even made the material a little stretchy so it still fit snugly if I changed my body size a little which I suppose would be useful if I ever had to do it tactically. Once it was attached, I readjusted my robes to look normal just in time for Ventrus to come out of the bathroom with a towel around his neck.

“And he finally blesses me with his reappearance,” I laughed as he rummaged through the closet himself to find one of his spandex undersuit thing that his species wears beneath their armor to reduce...chafing. “Hurry up and cover those bony hips, we gotta get a move on before Director Tann starts trying to slow down the ‘getting the hell out of here’ process.”

“Funny, I can’t name a single time seeing my hips has ever made you feel anything other than ecstatic,” he chuckled, grabbing one of the suits out before throwing his towel at me, which I narrowly ducked out of the way of, causing it to knock over the table lamp behind me.

“Ah, so he has jokes now? Just took, what, seven months of actual dating for you to start acting this freely?”

“Seven months of dating, about a year of awkward nights out-”

“And the dates the Pathfinder tricked us into going on.”

“I’m still 100% convinced she somehow managed to sabotage that mission to Pas-10 to make us land there.”

“I’m sure she also forced you to cry when the Ventreth flower got destroyed, huh?”

“Hey, that blast singed my fringe, that hurt.”

“I got shot in the face and didn’t cry, Ventrus.”

“Yeah well, you also don’t have eyes, so…”

“Touché, Turian,” I giggled as he finished up putting his suit on, characterized by the satisfying zip of the front of it. Rather than continuing to stand there for the next 20 minutes while he moved on to start putting on his armor set, I decided to go ahead and grab our bag to take to the docking bay with me. “Have fun, Ventrus. Meet me by the ship when you finish up, just don’t take too long or else I might have to leave you here.”

“Sir, yes sir,” he mocked as I noticed him start to hastily put on his pieces of armor. I couldn’t help but laugh while leaving the room as I heard him fall over as the door closed behind me.

The trip to the Docking Bay involved taking the transportation shuttle through the Nexus, which was relatively quick and got me there in less than a minute. Rather than keeping the ship in the main bay where it was just going to sit anyway, it was moved to the lower bay which serves as more of a ship storage facility. But once I stepped out onto the main bay, I could see that my ship was already out and waiting for me, so I guess that meant the request to leave the Nexus went through already.

The ship door automatically opened for me, letting me step up the ramp and head on inside. Since the xindraits don’t produce cellular waste as the Milky Way species do, we don’t have the need to relieve ourselves during missions meaning we don’t require much room for a bathroom other than showers. So even though we came to Andromeda on a ship big enough for four of my people, it was essentially just an ovular bubble with a cockpit and sleeping quarters inside of it and definitely looked small from the outside. And while I obviously can’t personally see any extra details, Ventrus has told me that the metal is sleek and silver, almost chrome enough to see your reflection off of.

Once inside, I slid my bag into the storage closet and took my seat at the helm of the ship. Instead of actual controls, the Xindrait ships work by the same signals we use for echolocation along with an autopilot system to keep us from having to navigate blindly ourselves. All I had to do was let out a few high-pitched noises and the ship’s engine started up, purring smoothly which was purposeful since the gentle and constant hum would give us a perfect view of the inside of the ship with the same echolocation rulings.

Next, I heard the heavy footsteps of Ventrus coming aboard the ship through the ramp entrance. Turning back, I could see him looking around the inside of the ship as he put down his weapons on the bed beside him near the entrance.

“Y’know, I don’t think you needed to bring two rifles with you for a checkup visit,” I smiled, turning back to face the control panel while he sat in the seat beside mine, buckling himself in eagerly.

“For the record, it’s not two rifles; it’s an assault rifle and a sniper…plus a pistol or two,” he laughed, patting the sidearm attached to his leg.

“Why do you even need them, we’re just going there to say hi and walk around a little.”

“It’s all for precaution. Best case scenario, I can leave it all on the ship. Worst case…”

“It’ll be fine, Venti. Just…don’t shoot anyone important, that’d be a political nightmare to try and clean up.”

“Don’t worry, I’ll only kill the ones that look at me funny.”

“Only one person even has functional eyes on the planet, and the chances of you getting to meet him are slim to none. The only looks you’ll be getting will be from the heads of the ASP and me…especially me.”

“Aw, if I could, I’d be blushing right now.”

“I’ll settle for you tightening those belt straps a little.”

“Ah yes, so I can sit and look forward at the metal wall in front of me.”

“Oh, yeah, we don’t really have a need for windows- sorry about that.”

“I can just keep my eyes on you the whole time if that’s suitable?”

“No need to make it sound so clinical, Venti. We’ll be there in a few hours…until then, feel free to keep yourself occupied however you see fit. If you want some more one-on-one time, then I’ll be free once we make it through the black hole,” I suggested, turning my attention back to the controls to close the ramp door and start to lift off from the ground.

Ventrus fastened his seat belt harness tighter and leaned back in his chair. I saw him start fiddling with his OT, so at least he was keeping himself distracted for the time being. Once we were off the ground, this shuttle was meant for extreme speeds through space, so we zipped out of the Nexus Bay and almost entirely out of the solar system in a couple of seconds.

“We’ll be at the black hole in a few minutes,” I told Ventrus. “Once we get there, I’ll have to put up some fancy shields and we’ll be able to get through it easily, then we’ll be right in my own galaxy!” I looked over at Ventrus, who was pushed back in his seat and gripping the armrests as the ship zoomed faster than anything I’d experienced with the Initiative’s ships.

“Can we slow this down at all? I feel like I’m about to go flying out of the ship.”

“Oh, you wouldn’t fly out at all. If anything, you would hit the back of the ship hard enough to turn you into putty.”

“Thanks, that was very relieving,” he muttered, voice all shaky.

I reached my hand out to him, which was met almost immediately by his, gripping mine tightly as we continued to speed through the stars, then tried to give him some sort of confidence boost, “Hey, you survived a horde of Thresher Maws and life as a Spectre in the Milky Way, a 600-year trip to another galaxy, and a kett invasion in Andromeda. Are you really gonna let a little speed be the thing that makes you quiver in your boots?”

His face went from fear to stern discipline and just like that, he was calm in his seat. “No, I’m...I’m not scared of anything,” he huffed, a sudden dash of boastfulness peppering across his face. “In fact…speed should be scared of me!”

I couldn’t help but giggle at his attempt to convince both of us that he was suddenly totally fine, especially since he still had a death grip on my hand. I figure it was helping him keep calm, so I might as well let him enjoy it while he can. “Alright, ready to go full speed?”

“This…isn’t full speed,” he asked with a gulp.

“Oh, not even close,” I laughed, cranking the speed all the way up to blast off into the stars, coming with an expected tighter grip on my hand from my suddenly-clammy turian companion.


	2. Entering Amarium

“We’re here,” I stated, slowing the ship down significantly as the sensors alerted me that we were approaching the black hole of Andromeda. The process of going through the black hole was nothing new to my people, we’d literally specialized our ships just for it, but I imagine the thought would still be at least minorly nerve-wracking for Ventrus.

“So, when we go through,” he paused, still gripping my hand tightly after the quick trip, “is anything gonna happen that I should know about? I’m not gonna like, feel my atoms be ripped apart or anything, am I?”

“No, not unless the shields malfunction.”

“There’s- there’s a chance of that happening?” he asked nervously.

“I’m kidding! If the shields malfunctioned, we would just die instead, likely painless.”

“There you go again, filling me with confidence.”

“What if I said that I promised that you won’t die a horrible, body-destroying death?”

“Terrible wording… but it helps a little.”

I leaned pulled his hand up to my lips, kissing his knuckles which usually seemed to work on calming him down- then again he was just a sucker for a little affection. I could hear his nervous groans slowly turn into happy purrs, eventually leading to him finally sitting comfortably in his seat once again.

“Alright, so how does this work exactly?” he asked. “I’m assuming the shield makes sure we don’t die, but does anything else happen that I should expect?”

“Well, all I know is that my ‘vision’ gets a little disoriented once we reach the Singularity Point- but I don’t know how you’ll experience it exactly. Maybe just… keep your eyes closed?”

“Sounds like a plan, K’yarn,” he laughed, leaning back and closing his eyes immediately.

I set the controls to activate the shield, making sure that everything was working properly before we plunged into the abyss.

“Alright, all systems are functioning properly… are you ready, Venti?”

“As ready as I can be, let’s get to Amarium all ready!”

I chuckled and activated the engines once again, shooting us off into the black hole. The ship rocked a little as we entered, but it wasn’t anything worse than extremely minor turbulence, even Ventrus didn’t seem phased by it. The ship suddenly, but expectedly, got quiet which was the scariest part of it for me since it meant that my vision was all but gone. Then suddenly I heard Ventrus let out a stunned, prolonged gasp that worried me.

“What’s wrong? Is something going on with your-,” I asked, cut off before I could finish.

“Don’t even say the seeing-spheres thing… but yeah. Everything is all… distorted-looking and colorful,” he responded with a hint of amazement in his voice.

I couldn’t see anything, the way the gravity inside of the black hole distorted everything, including the ability of my echolocation. Ventrus’ words made some things visible, but nothing had a solid form around me.

“Is it scary?” I asked, concerned.

“No,” he paused. “More like… concerning. This ship can handle this, right?”

“Well, I’ve been through dozens of black holes before and I’m not dead yet. Plus your body hasn’t been ripped in half so I’d be willing to bet that you’ll be just fine too.”

“You should see your face, it looks all… wavy.”

“I can’t see anything, Ventrus.”

“Yeah, I know but- you know what I mean!”

“Remember that time you gave me a cheese grater-”

“Yeah yeah, the most violent book you ever read, right? What audiobook did you find that one in? The… bad… jokes… book?”

“Wow, Venti pulling out the turian sense of humor for this trip, I feel so lucky.”

“I will throw you out of this ship right now.”

“I’d like to see you try, toothpick. Your armor weighs more than you do.”

“All I gotta do is open the flight door and we both go flying.”

“No, you go flying. I have the strength to hold myself inside. You would just be ripped apart atom by atom by gravity.”

“You… are no fun.”

The rest of the trip proceeded mainly with silence, minus the occasional gasp from Ventrus as I assumed the surroundings warped more. But after a few minutes, the ship rang and alerted us we had come out of the black hole safe and sound. I caught a relieved sigh from Ventrus as he lifted my hand to kiss it, letting me feel his mandibles twitching against it as my own vision started to recover now that we were free from the anomaly.

“See? I told you we would be fine,” I reassured him, taking the hand he was kissing and using it to stroke the side of his face. The gentle hum of his resumed purring made me feel comforted myself, knowing he wasn’t still scared of anything going on. I could see him unbuckle himself before standing up to stretch, then kneeling down beside my seat while his purrs only got louder. “Aw, you look so cute down there,” I laughed as I pet his fringe.

He rose back up, placing his hands on the arm of my chair and leaning over, nuzzling his head against mine which he always did when he was in need of a little attention and affection. I moved myself forward and gave him a soft kiss to tide him over for now, which was met with a sound I could only describe as a purr, whine, and meow combined as his lips parted to make contact with mine. I couldn’t help but laugh about it, but I would be lying if I said that it didn’t just make the whole situation even cuter. Once he got enough of me, he stood back up fully and yawned, likely tired from the adrenaline crash he would probably have had after being that stressed for so long.

As much as I wanted to get up with him and maybe even head back to the sleeping quarters for a little down time, I still had to pilot the ship back to Amarium.

“If you want to head back to the beds, you can take a nap if you’re drained. Trust me, the political nonsense you’re gonna have to listen to is gonna be just as boring,” I groaned, not looking forward to it either.

“I...might have to take you up on that,” he laughed before yawning and stretching his arms out again. “Are you sure you can manage up here without your bodyguard?”

“I’ll be alright Ventrus. It’ll be about ten minutes, think you can catch a nap by then?”

“I am already asleep, I’ll be cuddling with my guns if you need me.”

With the familiar sound of the bed creaking as he laid in it, I turned my attention back to the controls as I set the ship off just slow enough to not send Ven flying. It would still take us a little bit to get there, but the sound of his tired ass already snoring made the time a little more bearable

\-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Once the jump through the new galaxy was over, I set the controls to stop it and we were suddenly at my home planet: Amarium. I turned on the comms of the ship and was immediately met with harsh static that filled the ship and heavily distorted my ability to see anything. I suddenly had a raging migraine while the static stopped, fading into a low hum. I felt Ventrus’ hand on my shoulder, letting me know that the sound must have woke him up as well.

“What the hell was that sound?” he questioned, stumbling back to the cockpit and into his seat beside me.

“Unknown, but I’ve never heard anything like it,” I answered with uncertainty as I tried to reestablish the comms. “Whatever it was, it came from Amarium, it was on the landing frequency and that was more than just some random malfunction.”

Just then, another transmission came from the console. I focused onto the frequency to get it clearer and was able to catch a familiar voice demanding verification of who I was. I patched through my documentation and we waited for a few seconds before the low humming turned off and I got the signal that okayed our landing.

“Alright Ventrus, maybe keep your guns on the ship,” I pleaded, looking back at the bed where he left his rifles. “We might be blind but we know a gun when we see one and I really don’t want you getting obliterated as soon as we land.”

“No promises,” he chuckled as he sat back in his seat. “And what do you mean by obliterated? They’re not gonna blow the ship up, are they?”

“No, we just have very… special weapons on Amarium. They can give some splitting headaches.”

“Oh, you have to let me look at what you guys have here, I could totally make something really cool- maybe some kind of attachment for my rifle? Or would I need a whole new gun?”

“Tell you what, we’re landing in Nepasu, which is the part of the planet where we study space technology. Once we find out whatever’s causing the comm error and fix it, I’ll let you talk to one of our tech guys, I’m sure they’d love to work with an alien anyway.”

And with that, Ventrus had happily leaned back in his seat while I brought the ship down to the landing bay. As we approached the planet surface, the ship began to read the planet surface and detected a few… abnormalities. Usually, Nepasu is crawling with researchers and other ships, but it seemed like there were much more military personnel than usual and most of the ships were missing. I just assumed some more recon ships were out and there must’ve been some sort of inspection going on to explain the guards, but I was utterly clueless.

We landed smoothly, allowing both Ventrus and I to stand up and head towards the opening ramp. As soon as the door cracked open, I could tell something was wrong. The air was thick and tasted like smoke, worrying me enough to stand closer to Ventrus and hold onto his hand for comfort. Once the ramp fully opened up, the two of us stepped down and a concerned gasp from Ventrus worried me even more.

“What is it?” I asked him, not being able to see too far or clearly myself because of the air muddling my vision.

“Do you guys… always have barricade walls up?” he responded with a question, one that only further worried my suspicions at that.

“What else can you see? Does anything else look out of place?”

“Well, you told me how clear your skies were and it looks like it’s just… smoke. A lot of smoke coming from the west over there.”

Thinking about where we had landed, I knew that some of the places to the west of here included Nijop, a large city where my parents lived. Just thinking about what could possibly be happening on Amarium… we needed to get to the bottom of what was going on here.

Luckily, just then, we were intercepted by two guards who then began to escort us to the central research station of Nepasu just a short walk away. I kept a firm hold on Ventrus the entire walk but I couldn’t tell which of us it was helping more.

Stepping inside the building, we were immediately greeted by three familiar voices, one of which I recognized as the one that tried contacting us in orbit. The doors closed behind us and the gentle whine of the room made everything much clearer for me to see, but I was sure Ventrus would be confused as to who exactly was standing before us.

“Ventrus, these are the heads of the AUCE here: Triliek, Athruuz’uks, and Tornin,” I explained to him. “They’ve been the leaders of it for hundreds of years… and hopefully they can tell us exactly what’s going on here, right boys?” I looked over at them, noticing their nervous body movements that did little to help alleviate any stress I was feeling.

Tornin, the youngest sibling, was the first to step forward and address us, “K’yarneth, it’s been quite a few years, yes? You seemed to have come back during a rather… unprecedented time.”

“And what exactly is happening, Tornin? There’s military crawling everywhere and the comm system is beyond screwed.”

“Well, there’s been an outbreak of sorts,” he trailed off, stepping back to his brothers as Triliek, the youngest brother, stepped forward and took my free hand.

“K’yarneth,” he said, gripping my palm tightly. “It’s the Fer’yasai, they’re real.”

It took me a few seconds to even process what he said- the Fer’yasai? I hadn’t even heard that word in centuries, and what kind of “outbreak” could be going on? I thought they were supposed to be too far from Amarium to do any harm to us? I stepped back away from the brothers but was followed by Ventrus who I could see trying to comfort me… did I really look that outwardly worried? I figured my years of politics would’ve given me a better poker face by now.

“Ventrus- we need to get home, now,” I murmured, holding onto his arm as a wave of sickly dread filled the pit of my stomach.

“What’s the… ‘fair-yahtzee’?” he asked, terribly mispronouncing the term but still vocalizing some obvious signs of worry because of my reactions.

“Fer’yasai,” I corrected him. “They’re monsters, they didn’t evolve with the rest of my species, they just… went feral.”

Triliek chimed in, interjecting his own opinions, “They’re no xindraits, they’re beasts that we should’ve put down when we first learned about them!”

“They are xindraits, brother,” Tornin interrupted. “And we didn’t even know they were real for sure until they came here, so don’t act like you’re some great problem-solver when you’re cowering here with the rest of us.”

“You absolute idiots,” I cut in, harshly turning towards them. “Where are they now? I’m assuming they took out some of the comm towers in the Zriyansi block? How bad is the damage there?” Tornin and Triliek looked at each other silently, filling me with even more dread than before.

Suddenly, the middle brother, Athruuz’uks, stepped forward, speaking for the first time since we’d been here, “Ambassador K’yarneth… Zriyansi is gone. That’s where their attack started.”

As if I wasn’t already in shock before, that put me overboard. I found myself nearly falling backward, only being caught by Ventrus who must’ve had a mind full of questions by now.

“What’s the damage report? How many of the ferals are there here?” he asked, which took me aback at his willingness to try and ask them questions so boldly.

“They destroyed Zriyansi and they’ve been working on the other blocks, but they’ve been mainly focusing on Genshir’uklia, the main city of Amarium,” Tornin answered him. “For a bunch of beasts, they’ve been acting too calculated, I don’t like it.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” I asked, trying to ground myself once again.

“I… we fear that the Fer’yasai are either smarter than we ever believed them to be… or that someone or something is helping them for some reason.”

“Helping them? Why would anyone be helping them destroy our own planet?”

“Unknown, but we’ve been working on possible clues since the attack started this morning. Nothing’s come up, but it could be because any records were wiped when the attack took out Zriyansi.”

“Wait, this morning?” Ventrus interjected. “Are you telling us these ferals actually managed to wipe out this much of the planet in just a few hours?”

“As we said, they’ve invaded and with voracious force,” Arthruuz responded. “It doesn’t help that we’re blind either, we can’t even see where the threats are until they’ve started destroying entire buildings.”

“Can’t you guys call on backup or something? How are we supposed to get rid of those things if we can’t even defend ourselves?”

“We’ve sent most of our ships across the galaxies to find support, hence why the yard was so empty on your arrival. We’re hoping for as much support as we can get, but no ships have returned yet and we’re unable to communicate with them any better than we were with K’yarneth in Andromeda.”

We all sat in silence for a minute, contemplating how much a mess we all found ourselves stuck in. But the quiet was cut short with a loud, booming echo from outside followed by siren horns.

“They’re here,” Triliek halted, stepping back and into the wall behind him in fear. The other two brothers looked equally as concerned, not knowing how to react.

Ventrus patted me on the shoulder, “K’yarn- my guns are in the ship still.”

Looking around the room at the trembling trio and back to Ventrus, whose firm gaze gave me the first bit of confidence since we’d been here, I knew that staying inside this little bunker wouldn’t be doing us much good.

“Well then,” I said, holding onto his hands before looking over at the door. “Let’s go get them, show the Fer’yasai what Andromeda can bring to the table.”

We both stood in front of the door as the brothers hurried off into another, likely more secure part of the building.

“Pussies,” Ventrus laughed, earning a chuckle out of me too.

“We call that ‘kofu’ on Amarium,” I told him, letting him in on a little more of the fancy stylings of Xindrait vocabulary.

“Kofu… I’ll make sure to remember it, it’s gonna be a fun insult to use eventually, I’m sure of it.”

“Just make sure you stay alive long enough to use it, mister. Once the door opens, we’re booking it to the ship and then shooting everything that doesn’t look like me, got it?”

“Yes sir, just… please don’t let anything touch you, I’d hate to have to pry a feral version of yourself off of you.”

“Don’t worry,” I said as I reached my hand down under my robe and withdrew the pistol I had hidden under it earlier. “I can protect myself just fine,” His intense look became more obvious as he let out a low, grumbly purr of infatuation. “What’s wrong?” I asked.

“I have never been more attracted to you in my life than I am right now.”

“Oh be quiet, Venti. Save the sap for after we save the planet.”

“Fine, but I want a full cuddle session on the way back home. I feel like we’ll both need the relaxation time after this.”

I fiddled with the controls of the door like I did with the ship’s panel and it opened up. Immediately we heard shouting and horrific screeching that I knew must’ve been the ferals somewhere nearby. Ventrus took out his pistol as well and we took off directly towards the ship. He didn’t say anything, but I was able to see a few dead bodies around the ground, none of which belonging to the Fer’yasai.

We made it to the ship hassle-free, allowing Ventrus to get on board and grab what he needed. I stayed at the edge of the ramp to keep watch when suddenly something knocked me onto the ground with a brutal tackle. I was on my back with a mass of tentacles in my face, wavering about frantically as I was pinned to the ground. I could only assume this was one of the Fer’yasai, but I couldn’t see much of it except for the tendrils and the terrifying noises it was making. I struggled to wrestle it off of me when I noticed a slit between the mass of tentacles open up, revealing a long tube of teeth that I was sure it planned on using against me.

My strength was only so much and this thing had more than I did, so I knew I needed my gun with nobody else in sight to save me. I could see it to my left, just out of arm’s reach. I focused myself as best I could given the situation and was able to form one of my own tendrils over to grab the weapon and bring it back into my hand. I shoved the barrel down the thing’s throat and shot it, sending a plasma round through its entire body, killing it immediately.

I pushed the monster off of me and stood up to dust myself off and examine the body of what I just killed. Ventrus came running over with his weapons with a loud gasp as he noticed the body in front of me.

“K’yarn? I am so sorry, I didn’t hear you struggling I- you could’ve-,” he said, getting cut off by a kiss on the cheek from me.

“Don’t worry, I’m fine,” I gloated, holding up the pistol. “I’m basically a weapons expert now though, right?”

We both laughed before turning our attention back to the beast before us. It wasn’t much bigger than a xindrait but was definitely no humanoid. The thing had a hard body with tentacles jutting out from both ends and crab-like legs on the bottom. I had never seen anything like it before, and I could tell even Ventrus was concerned by it.

“Fer’yasai…” Ventrus said with a pause, kicking the body. “These things don’t seem too tough, at least not if you were able to take it out alone.” Just then, more screeching came from a distance in the field.

“Well, think you can kill a few more with me then, hotshot?” I laughed, gesturing over to where the sound came from.

Ventrus looked down at his rifle, inspecting it before turning it on and pointing it in front of him. “Let’s go kill some more of these kofus!”


	3. Genetic Imperfections

Compared to the more form-fitting garbs of the soldiers, Ambassador robes are remarkably harder to run across a battlefield in. But I’m nothing if not driven, so I was able enough to make do with Ventrus marching on by my side towards the sounds of what could only be more of the Fer’yasai. I felt his hand grab mine and pull me into cover along with several of the actual soldiers. The military force on Amarium uses Soti rifles, sound cannons that work especially well against anything with heightened hearing such as the Fer’yasai. Looking over at Ventrus, he was absolutely bewildered at how they worked since his people in the Initiative used more rudimentary guns that require actual ammunition.

“They use sound,” I laughed as he stared on. “Normal guns wouldn’t work for us, so ours put out a high frequency so we can see everything in front of us. Then it shoots out about 300 decibels in a focused beam which puts an end to about anything in front of it.”

He raised himself up to look over the barricade, “That’s… so fucking cool. But I can’t even hear anything firing?”

“Because you have average hearing. Trust me, I can see everything around us in disturbingly great quality right now.”

He turned back around from the barricade before worriedly grabbing my shoulder to get my attention. “Uh, K’yarneth, the ferals are coming from this side too!”

I whipped around and sure enough, another wave of the Fer’yasai were coming from behind us. The soldiers on our side of the barricade turned with me, leading to them firing on the new horde and leaving the original without nearly as much defense against them. We were just waiting to be overrun like this, we didn’t have enough firepower to take on a full assault from all sides like this.

“I have an idea,” Ventrus exclaimed as he stood from the barricade we were stationed at. He raised his hands up and suddenly his body’s shape went blurry which I knew meant he was powering up one of his fancy biotic abilities.

The blurred aura went past him in a sort of bubble until it surrounded us and the rest of the few soldiers with us, preventing the ferals from getting any closer to us as they were stopped by the energy barrier. The soldiers didn’t waste time trying to figure out what happened, instead just taking advantage of the situation and taking out the Fer’yasai as fast as they could. I decided to go ahead and put my pistol away since I was sure that the limited ammunition I had would come in handy if I found myself pinned down again in the near future.

Once the ferals were taken care of, Ventrus put his shields down before stumbling back over to me, exhausted. His biotics came in handy more often than not but they drained him of energy after a while. He leaned against me and sighed, likely wanting a hug and something to prop himself up against after the mixture of adrenaline and biotics that probably just sapped his energy from him.

“You did great, Ventrus,” I laughed as I let my arms wrap around his thin waist. “I think you quite literally saved all our lives.”

“So, are we even from Pas-10 yet?” he asked, nuzzling his face into my robes.

“Don’t get ahead of yourself, you still owe me one more from the kett ship.”

“Hey, I saved you from getting shot.”

“No, my headplate did. But you fixed me up so I’ll give you partial credit.”

“Can you do me another favor and give me a blindfold, it’s… highly disturbing to see so many dead tentacle monsters just laying on the ground.”

“Sometimes it’s a blessing to be blind, Venti,” I snickered, petting his fringe before the soldiers all suddenly stood straight up and ran back over toward the landing bay.

“Aw, where are they going? I was gonna ask them if I could have one of their guns.”

I could hear the gentle hum of a shuttle approaching us, similar to the hum of my own ship which meant it was likely another politician. But why would there be one coming here, and why now? I doubt a ship entering the atmosphere would be hardly enough reason to pay a visit during a Fer’yasai invasion.

“C’mon, let’s go see who it is. Maybe they can fill us in a little more than the brothers cowering in their laboratory right now,” I chuckled as I propped him up slightly to walk with me.

At the landing bay, all the soldiers had taken a knee and were already waiting for the ship ramp to open up. The only reason they would be bowing like that would be if it was someone extremely important- and then I knew who it had to be and my body was filled with a sickly amount of disdain and dread.

“Who’s that?” Ventrus asked, standing on his own while gazing on at the man stepping off the ship.

“That’s Elder Councilman Brilxox Scuziek,” I replied, with obvious distaste for the very sound on my tongue. “The man’s been around for almost 2,000 years and is, unfortunately, still wiggling around.”

“What’s wrong with him? Is he a bad leader or-”

“A fine leader, just an old-fashioned imbecile that has no business being in his position.”

“Yeah and… his face?”

“Yes, the lack of a faceplate. He’s the only member of the species with functioning eyes… and believe me, he makes it very known every chance he gets.”

“And the other one coming up behind him?”

“That’d be my sister, Ait-aama,” I said, a small smile finally coming to my face but quickly fading once I noticed Brilxox walking straight towards us. “She worked as his assistant when I left the planet, but to be honest I’m surprised she’s dealt with him for this long.”

As he got closer to us, I approached him and Ventrus followed close behind. I brushed past him blatantly and hugged onto my sister, who bared a striking resemblance to me much like other xindraits, only she only came up to roughly my shoulders like other xindrait women.

“I missed you, Ait-aama,” I smiled, brushing her shoulder of a spec of ash that had landed on the robing.

“You too, K’yarneth,” she replied happily, her voice pitched closely to mine but with a much more obvious hint of femininity behind it. “How’s Andromeda been? I’ve gotten some of your updates but I’ve been a little busy with-”

A sharp cough interrupted her, causing the two of us to separate and turn towards the origin of the noise: Councilman Brilxox himself. He looked at the two of us with a devilish smirk smeared across his face. I stepped back over to Ventrus as Ait took her spot behind Brilxox.

“K’yarneth Zhurkin, you must’ve been enjoying your vacation in Andromeda, no?” he asked mockingly. His voice was deep and aged, the trait of him living as long as he had. He looked over at Ventrus who was timidly standing to the side, “And I see you brought a bodyguard with you, and an alien one at that. Suppose it comes in handy when you can’t defend yourself.”

“It’s Ambassador Zhurkin, Councilman Brilxox, and I’d appreciate you using the title,” I said behind gritted teeth, taking everything in my power to not add him to the pile of Fer’yasai bodies behind us. “And this isn’t my bodyguard, sir. He’s my… bondmate,” I said shakily, realizing now more than ever how unnerving it was to give Ventrus a title in front of superiors, regardless of how low I valued a certain one’s opinion.

“Bondmate? You’ve already undergone the binding ritual then, I presume?”

“Well- no, but-”

“So he’s not your bondmate, just something to keep yourself occupied with then. I can’t say that I expected a former member of the Council to end up being a-”

“Councilman Brilxox, I humbly and respectfully ask you to please, continue with what you came here to say before me and my bondmate show you what we’re capable of together,” I said angrily, doing my best to clasp my hands together to refrain from strangling his limp neck with them.

“We did come here for-,” Ait-aama tried to speak but was harshly cut off by a shush from Brilxox, sending her back into silence while my want to get into a fight only grew.

“He was speaking to me, girl,” he said harshly, stepping up closer to me which led to Ventrus shifting his rifle by reflex. “I’m assuming you got our transmissions, yes?”

“Earlier today,” I replied, trying to let myself sink back into a more professional mindset while I could. “But it was terribly spotty. All I could make out was the planet’s name and some distress.”

“Ever since the outbreak started, the rest of the AUCE has been debating on what to do. Your father insisted that you might be able to help, but I don’t see how nor why we would need your assistance.”

“Maybe because I’m one of the few that actually knows about the Fer’yasai, Councilman? Unless your mind has started to slip even further since my departure.”

He grunted before harshly turning his back to us, trudging through the soot of the ground back to his ship, expecting us to follow him.

Ait-aama was the first to speak, stepping over to Ventrus and offering her hand, “I read that this is how you Andromeda aliens greet each other… it’s called a handshake, right?”

Ventrus laughed before attaching his rifle onto his back and shaking her hand, “It’s more of a human thing but it caught on after a few decades. I’m Ven-”

“Ventrus, yeah? K’yarneth has talked about you a lot!”

“Uh, Ait-aama,” I cut in nervously. “I don’t think it’s really that much-”

“He sent me a hundred-page document about turians and asked if I could read over it along with some notes he took so he could see if he knew enough about your species to be respectful.”

“Aw, K’yarn, how adorable,” Ven cackled with my sister.

“We should really get going,” I interjected. “Don’t wanna keep the cranky grandpa waiting on the ship.”

“He’s right, Councilman Brilxox is already cranky enough without you and your boyfriend getting into his head,” Ait laughed as she turned to lead us back to the shuttle they came in.

The two of us followed behind her a few feet, taking a second to collect ourselves. We’ve been on the planet for all of about twenty minutes and we’ve already been through a full-on battle and now we’re getting dragged to the next place to keep on getting shoved deeper into this mess. I had to give Ventrus some credit; he’d been in the military for years so I’m sure he’s more adapted to this kind of thing than I am, but it must be a lot to suddenly be thrown into now that he’s obviously worrying about me. I pulled him up next to my body, leading to him leaning his head against my shoulder with a sigh of relief.

Once on the ship, the door to my right quickly closed. The cockpit was to the right and I could hear Ait-aama inside fiddling with the controls, so I knew that the right must’ve been the Councilman’s quarters; figures that ungrateful slug would have the audacity to try and act like I don’t exist at a time like this.

“Don’t worry, he’s turned into even more of an asshole since you left,” I heard Ait-aama call out from the cockpit. She was always a little more upfront with her feelings, it honestly amazed me that she was able to keep her job as long as she had with that mouth on her.

Ventrus and I made our way into the cabin with Ait, taking the two seats behind her so we could all talk during the trip. The both of us buckled in as the ship started to lift up off the ground, then we felt the gentle push against us as the ship began dashed forward.

“So, I’m assuming we’re headed to Seijasa, right?” I asked, leaning forward slightly to address her more directly.

“Yes, the Council has been holding a meeting there all morning,” she replied, turning her head back to me and then to Ventrus. “Seijasa is the government block of Amarium, by the way. It’s basically just a giant building where the Councilpeople bicker until they reach a majority and make a decision.”

“The humans had something like that in the Milky Way,” laughed Ventrus. “Though from what I’ve heard there were a lot more people and it was split into political parties.”

“That sounds… awful. How did they ever accomplish anything?” she asked, bewildered.

“From what the Pathfinder has told me- they basically didn’t. Goes to show why they were the last species in the galaxy to be found,” he chuckled but quickly trailed off into silence before turning to me. “K’yarneth… what if we don’t get to see Sky or- anyone else from Andromeda again?”

“Don’t worry, Ventrus,” I sighed, just as concerned as he was but trying my best to not show it. “Once we get all of this sorted out, we’ll be back home in no time.”

Ait-aama shifted in her seat uncomfortably as the room went quiet. “Has anyone actually told you what happened yet? You guys weren’t here too long before we came to get you.”

“Just that the Fer’yasai somehow managed to take out Zriyansi, that’s about it,” I replied, leaning back in my chair again at the weight of the words that just came out of my mouth. An entire block, just decimated- how many people died during the attack? How many have died since then? How far have the ferals gone since then?

“Zriyansi is the only block confirmed to be destroyed so far because that’s where the attack started. They reportedly started coming up from the ground in hordes and wiped everything clear. And because of it, most of the Council thinks that the invasion started because of some experiments gone wrong- or at least that’s what they’re telling the people for now.”

“I doubt it, we’ve already known about them for centuries but the Council decided that covering it up would be better than telling the people- and now look at what happened; we’re all stuck ill-prepared and dying for it.”

“I meant to ask you about that, actually,” Ventrus quietly added. “The brothers back where we landed- they thought the ferals were a myth but it sounds like you guys already knew what they were.”

“Because we do,” I replied solemnly, turning my head to look at him while Ait-aama adjusted to fully keep her mind on the controls, likely wanting to avoid the same conversation. “About 2,000 years ago - when Transmutation Day happened across the galaxy - all of our planets were affected by the radiation. Amarium is our home planet and so we were able to recover since we had resources available to do so… but out other colonies weren’t so lucky.”

“We had something similar happen with my species a few centuries before I was born, but the Turian Hierarchy stepped in and was able to unite everyone… then again they only had a civil war to deal with, not a mass mutation across an entire species.”

“Yeah, and we didn’t know how to handle it. It took centuries for us to even begin rebuilding space flight, and by then the differences between us and the people of our colonies were more drastic than we could have imagined. Without supplies to survive or come to any sort of order, they continued mutating to fit their environments- into monsters.”

The ship went quiet again, nothing but the gentle hum of the ship’s motor. I felt Ventrus’ hand grasp onto mine, trying to offer some semblance of emotional support for a situation he couldn’t possibly understand. He must’ve been more lost now than ever.

“What happened once your people found out about the colonists… the Fer’yasai?”

“Well, the first to discover them was Brilxox himself during an expedition. Everyone else in his party died but he came back beyond frightened and told us everything. Then, as a group, we agreed to keep it a secret to avoid scaring the people. We figured that it’d be better to tell them that their former friends and family were gone instead of telling them that they had become horrific predators. And now people are dying because of a decision that I made almost two millennia ago.”

“It’s not your fault K’yarneth, there’s no way you could’ve known anything bad would happen literally thousands of years after you guys made a decision,” he said, interlocking his fingers between mine. “Plus… this whole thing leaves a sour taste in my mouth. If they’re really feral, then they’d have no way of getting here on their own, someone must’ve helped them for some reason.”

“I don’t know, Ventrus. We just have to hope we can get this resolved as quickly as possible, I know there have to be hundreds dying by the minute, if not more.”

Ventrus turned his seat around to face mine, then pulled mine around to face his as well. He took a page out of my own book and pulled me into a forehead press that did a surprisingly great job at comforting me- I’ll have to give him props for it when we get back to the Nexus.

Suddenly, I could feel the ship start to slow and eventually stop, meaning we were finally at Seijasa. Our seats automatically turned and clicked back into place as the landing procedures started, making Ait-aama giggle.

“We’re here, lovebirds! Sorry to break up your little moment.”

“It’s fine, need to get our heads in the game anyway to deal with some more political nonsense,” Ventrus chimed in, making me groan dramatically.

“Ugh, I haven’t missed being here,” I stated dryly, remembering how boring it was deciding the rules of an entire species. “Our father took over once I left so I hope they haven’t worked him half to death yet.”

“He’s been doing fine, actually,” Ait-aama added. “He’s actually been giving a piece of his mind to Brilxox whenever he needs to which might be why he hates you so much now too.”

The three of us shared a little bout of laughter while the ship finally touched down to the ground. We stood from our seats and walked out into the entrance area of the shuttle just in time to see Brilxox hurrying down the ramp and towards the government building.

“So, if I were to call him a kofu-,” Ventrus quipped, causing both Ait-aama and I to burst out laughing.

“As funny as it would be, I highly suggest you don’t unless you wanna get booted into a pit of Fer’yasai,” Ait responded, patting his shoulder on the way out of the ship. “After all, now you have to be a good example as the Ambassador’s boyfriend.”

Ventrus and I stood at the exit of the ship for a few seconds, looking around as best we could. Most of Seijasa was flat, save for the actual main building, so I knew Ventrus wasn’t gonna be marveling at much besides the concrete that made up most of the ground. I took his hand into mine and bumped against him to get his attention, then gestured forward to get going.

“Are you ready to meet the most boring group of politicians in the universe?”

“Well, I’ve had to deal with you for a few years so I think I’ve got enough training,” he chuckled, a soft purr rumbling in his throat as we started down the ramp.

“Oh, and you’ll get to meet my dad as long as we don’t get slammed with something to keep us busy- though I wish the circumstances for the first meeting were a little better.”

“Hey, I just saved his son and some science nerd brothers from dying so I think I have a good start going so far.”

“Alright, hotshot, don’t get too cocky now, my dad wouldn’t like that much arrogance, he probably gets enough of it from Brilxox on a daily basis.”

“Don’t worry,” he finished, leaning over to give me a quick kiss on the cheek. “I’ll make sure your dad loves me about as much as Brilxox hates us.”


	4. The Bonds That Tie

The walk from the landing bay to the actual building, Seriseifu, was barely more than a brisk walk away, but the size of the building was beyond massive. It was essentially just a large, concrete rectangular prism since us xindraits have no need for fancy architecture, including the outside grounds which were just as flat and presumably colorless. And despite that, I could see Ventrus looking around in amazement.

“So, how am I gonna see inside if there aren’t any windows- or am I gonna have to just cling onto you the whole time,” he joked, obviously not minding the latter of the two options.

“Well, this building isn’t just for the Council,” I began to explain. “It also houses the Ambassadors of other species that decided to set up here. And since most of them had eyes, we had to add some lighting so they weren’t stumbling around all the time.”

“Wow, to think I’m just a humble soldier walking into a hall full of important politicians.”

“I’ll stop you there, most of the Ambassadors are barely civil enough to even hold a conversation with, let alone feel lesser than. You’d make a better Ambassador than most of them.”

“Ambassador Kovarik- it has a nice ring to it. Though I’m not sure that I could handle being stuck around the old slug… who’s just standing at the front doors so Ait-aama can open them for him.”

Sure enough, looking forward, I could make out Councilman Brilxox waiting while Ait unlocked the doors and held them open so he could breeze past her and head straight inside. We weren’t too far behind so she held it open for us as well, giving us a courteous smile before closing it behind herself once she entered as well after us.

Walking inside of Seriseifu made me feel so safe, something I hadn’t truly felt ever since we got the spotty transmission in orbit before landing. Even Ventrus must’ve felt better since I could hear him let in a small inhale of relief, all of us getting some air that didn’t wreak of death or dust kicked into it. Ventrus still held onto me, now instead wrapping his arm around mine to keep close, likely wanting to avoid getting blamed for touching anything he shouldn’t with Brilxox continuously looking back over his shoulder at all of us.

This room was simply a bland hall, existing just as an entryway to leave any non-important items that visitors came with. But considering we were in a bit of a hurry, we proceeded right through the set of automatic doors in front of us, leading us down a long, narrow hall with doors along the sides leading to Embassy offices. Much to our concern, the floors were covered in scattered papers and loose personal items seemingly belonging to the Ambassadors that were nowhere in sight.

“They all left,” Brilxox mumbled out, the first hint of doubt I’ve ever heard from him ringing in his voice. “Once the attack began, they rushed to get off the planet- but we never got confirmation on whether they made it or not.”

“Not a single one?” Ventrus asked, bewildered. “How many Ambassadors were here? I know you guys have met a lot of other aliens but-”

“Over 300,” he interrupted, pausing to turn back and look at us. “There are over 300 unconfirmed lives because of this madness, and now millions of our own people as well.”

He turned and continued down the hall, Ait-aama having to follow close behind while Ventrus stood beside me, not knowing how to react still. A gentle pull from me caught his attention and we were off walking again but the two of us couldn’t help but look around at the chaos under our feet. These people were terrified, desperate to leave… and there’s a chance they could’ve all died before they even made it off the planet.

Eventually, we all made it into the elevator at the end of the hall. Ventrus and I stood at the back while the Councilman and Ait stood in front of us so Brilxox could use his access to get us to the Council’s chambers. He activated the elevator with a quick scan of his hand on a specialized sensor, but I could feel Ventrus shift slightly to watch.

“Uh, Councilman,” he questioned, a puzzled look on his face. “Sorry if it’s just a common xindrait thing but- what’s with the black spot on your hand?”

The elevator went silent for a few seconds as we began to rise to the top floor where the Council was waiting. A black growth on the skin- that could only mean one thing for a xindrait, especially one as old as Brilxox.

“It’s…” he pauses, not knowing how to respond to Ventrus. “I have Ganatani, it started a few months ago.”

Ventrus looked to me for an explanation, which I was hesitant about with Brilxox himself with us but he didn’t seem to be angered at the moment, so I figured it could at least be somewhat of an educational experience for Ven.

“Ganatani is a special form of cancer that xindraits can get,” I explained. “Since our DNA is constantly changing and adapting thanks to the radiation we got during Transmutation Day, a lot of xindraits die from cell mutations causing cancers around the body..”

“Yes, and mine’s already crippled my arm,” Brilxox groaned, looking down at his hand. The elevator goes quiet again until it stops and the doors open, revealing another hallway before us that leads to the Council Chambers. “Look, I… apologize for any outbursts you’ve had to endure,” he mumbled, genuinely taking me back- since when had he ever shown any sign of remorse? Was it only because we knew his secret now? “I feel sick everyday and now I’ve got to deal with an extinction-level event on top of it. My mind just… isn’t handling it all too well.”

And with that, he walked off without us, all three standing with our jaws hung open in shock. We all looked at each other for confirmation that what happened actually happened.

“So he’s not an ass, just a standard grumpy old man?” Ventrus asked, trying to humor us out of the situation.

“He has been worse the past few months, I suppose it could be the Ganatani causing it,” Ait-aama responded, then walked off after the Councilman.

This time it was Ventrus who pulled me to start walking with him. Brilxox’s excuse seems plausible but- I couldn’t place it, something still seemed off about it all. For his personality to just change like that, there had to be more going on, but I didn’t feel like calling a dying man a liar, so I let it go for then, at least until the more pressing matters were dealt with.

The short walk brought us to another set of automatic doors, this time bringing us to the Council’s chambers. The room was wide open but was still just big enough to contain a large desk close to the wall to seat all ten Councillors and a few yards in front of it to allow visitors and other speakers to observe. Brilxox took his seat at the desk near the middle while Ait stood just ahead of us and introduced us to the Council.

“People of the Amarium Council of Tranquility,” she addressed them calmly. “I present former Councilman and current Ambassador, K’yarneth Zhurkin, as well as his turian bondmate from the Andromeda galaxy, Ventrus Kovarik.”

She stepped off to the side and I went forward, keeping Ventrus close to me. I could feel him lightly trembling, probably afraid of making a bad impression in front of the most important people on the planet which I was as well, but I guess working with them for so many years has let me present it a lot less.

“Of all times to drag an alien to our planet- you choose now, Ambassador Zhurkin?” questioned Councilman Troqrux. While he’s respectable- he has always been rather distrusting of aliens, now more than ever I would assume.

“Now isn’t the time for your xenophobic attitude, Councilman,” said Councilwoman Gixeon harshly. She was the youngest on the Council, replacing her own father and giving her a seat of power at just over thirty years old; essentially a child by our standards but an adult still technically, hence why the position was allowed to be passed down. “I apologize that you’ve had to deal with so many grumpy old politicians today, Ambassador, truly.”

Then a soft chuckle came from the other side of the table like familiar music to my ears. I looked over and up stood my personal favorite member of the Council: my father, Hirzih.

“How’s Andromeda treated you, boy?” he asked me with a soft smile on his face. 

“Now isn’t the time for a joyous family reunion,” interrupted Troqrux, causing a few dissatisfied groans from the rest of the Council aimed at him.

“With all due respect, Councilman, he was talking to me, not you,” I answered, turning my head to face my father once again. “And my time has been extremely tame compared to the past half hour here, to say the least.”

Brilxox was the next to stand, “Great, everyone’s caught up, yes? Can we please proceed with how we’re going to save the planet from complete annihilation?”

As rude as it sounded out loud, he was right, we had more important things to discuss. The rest of the Council stood in unison while Councilwoman Zundrun, one of the first-ever members of the Council, raised a tablet from her spot at the table, swiping upwards from it which darkened the room as a large holographic image filled the palace ceiling of the room. Visuals like this were made from a mixture of actual visual qualities and radio frequencies so both xindraits and alien visitors would be able to see it for convenience, so I felt a little easier knowing Ven could see whatever we were going to be addressing rather than me having to try and describe it him myself.

“This… is what’s left of Zriyansi,” she muttered as she gestured her hands to the hologram which seemed to show almost nothing except for smoking remnants of buildings and rubble. There were many little blots moving around the image that I could only assume were a number of Fer’yasai still roaming the area. “If you look near the middle of the block, you can see what appears to be a chasm in the ground- which is where we’ve concluded that the Fer’yasai erupted from to start their attack.”

“Yes, it was investigated partially by a few research drones but something down there is interfering with our signals to the point where they shut down as soon as they enter,” added Brilxox. “We believe it’s a sort of transmission scrambler, something similar to what took out our ability to establish communications to many of our other Ambassadors, save for you, K’yarneth.”

“With what little information we’ve gotten from other sources like a few mining teams, we can confirm that the chasm leads to a tunnel system, a long one. But we can track the transmission through the tunnels and stop it as well as see if we can gather enough information from it to find out who’s behind all of this.”

“Who?” I asked quickly afterward. “So are you saying that it definitely was a person that started the invasion?”

“It would be the only way, but we still have no idea why- what xindrait would want the destruction of their own planet?” she spoke rhetorically, causing the room to grow silent in thought before she spoke again. “Regardless, a field team is being assembled and dispatched full of scientists and our own Marjini… that would be the Council’s private military soldiers, Bondmate Kovarik.”

I looked back at Ventrus who was becoming increasingly flustered and rubbing the back of his neck while Ait chuckled softly from her position next to him.

“Can I ask now why exactly I was called here myself?” I questioned, still not having been told what was so important for me specifically.

“Because you’re the most qualified member of our species to fight something like this,” Brilxox answered. “Thanks to your reports on fighting those dreadful gene-stealing kett aliens in Andromeda, you became a very obvious person of interest in terms of dealing with these… living genetic mutations.”

“And what of my- what about Ventrus?”

“Well, he’s welcome to stay here with us for protection if he’d like.”

“I don’t think so,” Ventrus chimed in, stepping forward for the first time and stopping next to me. “If K’yarneth gets to kick some monster ass then so do I!”

I couldn’t help but smile once the realization of what he said hit him, “Exactly what he said, he’ll be coming with me and the field team, then.”

Councilwoman Zundrun laughed before closing the hologram and allowing the room to light up again, “Very well, we can use all the extra arms we can get… even if you only have two to offer.” She looked at the rest of her fellow members and raised her hands, “Unity, rise. This meeting of the Council of Tranquility is adjourned.”

The rest of the Council stood up with her and bowed, then turned to the wall behind them where doors opened for each to return to their private rooms… all except for my father, Hirzih. He immediately began walking over to us with his arms spread out wide. He wrapped around the necks of Ait and me, squeezing us both tightly before releasing us only to grab me by the sides of the face and placed a kiss on the top of my faceplate. He hadn’t done it since I was a kid, so I just knew he was doing it to get me embarrassed in front of my company.

“I missed you, boy!” he exclaimed, keeping a firm hold on me. “And you brought someone with you! This is the Ventrus that your sister’s told me about, right?”

“I missed you too, Dad,” I responded as he let me go and then turned to face the turian himself. “And yes, this is the Ventrus. He’s a turian originally from the Milky Way.”

“Alright then Ventrus, it’s great to finally meet you! I learned an expression from one of K’yarneth’s reports- c’mon, up high!” he said excitedly, holding his hand up high above his head. Even though I was already normally taller than Ventrus by about a foot when I wasn’t shrinking myself down to match him, my father was… much taller than even I, closer to the ten-foot mark which had Ventrus craning his head up to try to look at him.

“I… uh- sir, I can’t reach,” Ventrus said nervously, not wanting to offend my father in any way.

“I’m just messing with you, short stuff,” he laughed, rubbing the top of Ventrus’ head which made him hunch due to my father’s size. “Alright kids, come along, we should talk in my room here so you guys can relax for a few minutes before your big mission!”

He pulled Ventrus in with an arm around his shoulders, leaving Ait and I following behind them, snickering as Ventrus nervously shuffled along. The doors opened for us and Dad took a seat at a workbench off to the right of the room along with Ventrus, meanwhile Ait sat at his work desk and I pulled up a seat beside Ventrus to keep him from panicking and feeling alone with my father’s extravagant personality.

“So, Ventrus, can you pass me that rifle on your back?” he asked, holding his hands out for it.

“Oh, um, sure?” Ventrus agreed nervously, removing the Phaeston rifle from his back and placing it into my father’s hands.

My dad moved it around in his hands, tracing his fingers down the side before clicking a button on it which made the pieces come loose for easy disassembling. Ventrus looked concerned but too afraid to stop him, so I did my best to fill him in.

“Dad was in our military before Transmutation Day, been a gun nut ever since… kinda like you, actually, Ventrus,” I joked, but it was enough to put Ven at ease for the moment while Dad took some parts from his drawer and got to work on the Phaeston.

“I’m just adding a little attachment to the side of it, it just needs to be welded into the gun, not just slapped on the side,” he explained as the sound of him melding a small, rectangular box to the underside of the gun filled the room. After a few seconds, Dad clicked the loose pieces of the gun back together and handed it back to Ventrus, who immediately tried to figure out what the attachment was. “I’m sure you’ve seen the Soti rifles our military uses by now, right?”

“Yeah, they looked really cool- wait… did you…” Ventrus asked in disbelief before glancing back down at the small box.

“If you aim that little box at something and press the button on it, it’ll act like a miniature version of our rifles! Not quite as powerful but they’ll definitely disorient someone from a distance and cause some real damage if you wanna get up-close and personal.”

“I don’t even know how to- thank you, so, so much!”

“Ventrus has been wanting to get his hands on a Soti ever since he saw one, you probably just made his whole life worth living,” I chuckled as Ventrus kept his eyes trained on his gun still.

“I think you’re the one that made his life a little brighter, K’yarneth,” Dad laughed. “Just hope it doesn’t malfunction! I mean, it shouldn’t, but I did try to make an anti-gravity gun before and… let’s just say it was impossible to put down.”

“Dad- did you just-”

“Just what? I’m trying to lighten the mood a little!”

“I’m- please-”

“Hi, Please! I’m-”

“Okay, that’s enough,” AIt chimed in, cutting Dad off before he could make the whole room wish we were surrounded by the ferals right now.

“I’m sorry kids, I just feel like it’s been forever since we’ve all been together like this! When was the last time? At least a decade by now, right?”

“It was well before I left for Andromeda- I think it was when Ait became Brilxox’s assistant? I remember we partied all night because I said her life was gonna be over now that she was under the boot of that geriatric idiot.”

“I almost threw up about six times and then I smacked one of the Council guards,” Ait laughed, leaned back in her seat.

“Yeah and we had to bail you out before they sent you to the mines. You’re lucky Dad was part of the Council and had enough pull to get you free.”

We all laughed, even Ventrus who finally put his upgraded rifle on his back again, trying to get more involved with our banter. Dad looked between Ven and me, smiling before continuing.

“I remember when you were just a little Kishantey, K’yarneth,” he said reminiscently. Ventrus turned to me with a small snicker as he must’ve realized now where I had gotten the term from when I would use it to tease him occasionally. “And look at you now! You’re an Ambassador for our whole species, a former Councilman, and now you’ve got someone important enough that you can just march up to the Council arm-and-arm with him? That’s absolutely amazing!”

“Hey, he’s the first alien I met in Andromeda that didn’t look terrified of me, plus it helps that he’s easy to fluster and has one absolutely amazing waist,” I smiled as I gripped his narrow waist which made him jump in surprise in his seat, making my sister laugh hysterically from behind us.

“K’yarneth… I’m so… beyond proud of you, son. And I know your mother would be too if she was still here.”

The room went quiet again, my family seemingly starting to get lost in memories while Ventrus probably found himself caught in another family moment he didn’t know how to maneuver through. But Dad eventually stood up, looming over the rest of us before opening his arms up and pulling me into another hug, followed by Ait who joined in, and even Ventrus who got pulled in by one of Dad’s tentacles. As much as I know I wanted to instinctively pull away, something about this all finally hit me. Being here with my family, and with Ventrus, it gave me an emotional boost that I didn’t even know that I needed. I knew now more than ever what I was fighting for: not just for me and my family, but for every family on Amarium, even the ones that wouldn’t be whole anymore because of the damage already done. And as long as I had people like my Dad, like Ait-aama, like Ventrus- I knew I could do it all.

“So, K’yarn, Ventrus,” my dad paused for a second. “Do you guys plan on letting any little hybrids run around anytime soon or-”

“Dad! Not a topic for right now!” I exclaimed, pushing away from him as he let the hold on all of us go.

“Kidding! I was kidding! You gotta at least save the planet first, right?”

We all laughed again as a quiet ring played on Ait’s wrist pager, “Looks like the team is ready to go whenever you guys are.”

I looked over at Ventrus who was still shaking a little but looked like he had gotten the same boost I did from all this, a new sense of inspiration to keep going forward. I let my fingers interlock with Ventrus’ again, moving my head to gesture to the door as Ait took a seat next to Dad since she would be staying here while we were gone.

“K’yarneth- I love you,” Dad said, that same, genuine grin across his lips. “Go out there and make everyone proud, we’re gonna have to rub this in Brilxox’s face once it’s all over, plus it’d be a bonus to say my son saved the planet.”

I smiled back at him, giggling as Ven and I made our way to the door, “I love you too, Dad. And you, Ait. I’ll be back before you know it.”

“Hoshyta kukoni, K’yarneth.” whispered my father, finishing just as the doors closed behind us.

We walked out back to the elevator, planning on taking it all the way back down to leave out the back exit where the team’s ship would be waiting for us. But on the ride down, Ventrus’ curiosity finally peaked.

“So… what’s that saying mean, exactly? ‘Hoshyta kukoni’? Is it a joke or something?”

“Not really- just something my mother used to say that the rest of our family uses as motivation for each other now.”

“Oh, so kinda like the humans’ carpe diem thing?”

“It means ‘May the stars guide you’. She used it when I started exploring space and it just sorta… stuck, I guess.”

“Your mom sounds really great- hopefully less huggy than your dad.”

“She would have loved you, Ventrus, don’t worry. And she was more of the type to offer refreshments instead of breaking your spine with a hug.”

Ventrus laughed to himself, leaning his head over to rest on my shoulder as the elevator continued to decline, but I could hear him still talking to himself, maybe his own sort of self-motivation or just a tactic to remember the phrase.

“Hoshyta kukoni.”


	5. Uncharted Territory

The backside of Seriseifu was the same as the front considering the entire outside of the building was one solid block of concrete and metal for stability purposes, but the back lot contained a few ships made especially for the Councilpeople, being much roomier in terms of private quarters for the Council, much like the ship Bilxox and Ait had picked us up in. But we weren’t to be treated to such luxury, instead, I noticed we were likely catching a ride in the battlecruiser that the Marjini were stationed outside of.

While xindraits typically share the same headplate, our higher-ranked military such as the Marjini had helmets that covered the mouth and back of the head as well as a suit of more padded armor to protect from multiple types of gunfire.

The one thing that was surprising was the fact that the scientists coming with us were familiar- the Khatsull brothers from our landing in Nepasu. Walking to them, I couldn’t help but notice the glances from the Marjini soldiers- almost like we were being personally analyzed by them. Then again, if I were a highly-skilled soldier and were told to escort some random Ambassador and an alien through caves, I would be checking them out too.

“Ambassador! ...Alien Friend!” loudly exclaimed Tornin, waving us down as we approached.

“Ah, so we meet again,” I smiled, stopping just before them with Ventrus at my side. “So I trust you won’t be hiding in any more bunkers before this mission is over, right?”

“Soon after you two left with the Councilman, we received a call from him telling us to fly here on our own shuttle- so we came and were told by the Marjini themselves that we were assigned to be with them and you, too.”

“If you guys got here after us- then that means the Council already decided on their plan before we even got here to be added to the mission.”

“Or at least one of the Councilmen had already decided, not unlike Brilxox to take the Council into his own hands like this.”

A strong grunt caught our attention, causing us to look over at the Marjini who had begun entering the carrier. While the typical shuttles were big enough to hold a small crew of anywhere from two to five people, like the one I arrived in Andromeda on with my assistants, this one was larger as it was meant to hold troops for drop missions and occasionally do its own centralized shooting with side-mounted turrets.

We walked in after the Marjini, Ventrus and I then took a moment to look around while the soldiers quickly filed into the front half of the ship through the left, locking the electric door behind them. The brothers headed off to the right into the more science-centered side of the ship, closing the door behind them but leaving it unlocked which was a significantly less rude way of telling us they were doing something themselves in there. No sooner did the doors behind us close, the now all-too-familiar rise in my stomach alerted us that the ship had started to rise, then the gentle push against my body let me know we were moving along.

I went over to the wall across from us and pressed my back against it, sinking down until I was sitting in the first little moment of relaxation since we’d been here. Ventrus followed suit and sat next to me, though it was rather funny to see him try and sit down with that bulky armor of his. I leaned my body over to slump against his shoulder, letting my arms go around his waist to pull us closer into each other as a soft, gentle purr already began to come from his throat.

“So what should we do once we get off this rock?” I asked him playfully.

“First thing’s first,” he replied, shifting to let me get a better grip on his body. “I’m shoving this in Sky and Aurelius’ faces. Then the two of us are taking a well-earned vacation to somewhere tropical and isolated. I need a break from buildings and people after all this.”

“Oh, what about Havarl? Lots of trees and stuff there, plus so shallow waters so you can go in without drowning.”

“Hey- that’s a turian thing, not just me. But… I can’t say I hate the idea.”

“Of drowning? Kinda macabre but whatever you’re into, I guess.”

“What? No- the water idea, dummy. Hopefully I’ll do better than when Aurel tried.”

“Don’t worry, I’ll make sure that I’m there to hold you up, no turians are drowning… at least you aren’t, it was funny watching it happen with Aurel.”

“I hope not, then who would you embarrass in front of our friends by over-sharing what we do in our off-time.”

“Well,” I paused as I rose slightly, positioning myself into his lap as he looked up in amazement. “I wouldn’t have to blab if you didn’t give me so much to talk about.”

“Now this has to take the cake for bad timing, K’yarneth.”

“I don’t see you pushing me off, Ventrus.”

“You can’t see anything, you little-” he chuckled but was suddenly cut off by a loud blast and harsh rocking of the ship that sent me onto my back and him to the side onto the floor.

The sound was more familiar to me - the sound of the ship’s turrets firing, likely at some Fer’yasai on the ground. I laughed at the position we found ourselves in but the purring from Ventrus had stopped as a sudden jolt probably knocked the wind out of him.

“It’s fine, just the Soti Cannons firing,” I smiled, sitting back up as Ventrus did the same.

“That is… terribly dangerous,” he said shakily, leaning back against the wall as the ship’s residual rocking calmed down. “How on Palaven did that pass inspection, the engineer back home would’ve been kicked into space for that big of a design flaw.”

“Well, the guns are attached to the middle of the ship- where we’re at now. So we just let the middle of the ship rock while the rest stays perfectly straight. Let’s us put some real power into the guns and we don’t have to worry about stabilization since nobody hangs out in the middle of the ship.”

“Nobody… except for us right now, then.”

“I- yeah, we should probably get out of here before the next one throws you out the doors,” I laughed, standing up and then offering my hands to Ven to help him get up since I knew turians had a hard time getting up like that with their odd digitigrade legs.

“We’ll make it a rain check then, yeah? Maybe on the ship ride back home?” he suggested, kissing my hand as he stood.

“Maybe if you beg hard enough, though I guess we’ll have earned the few extra hours before getting back home.”

I pulled him into me again, this time letting my lips connect with his which felt much more comforting than it had before, then again I suppose it made sense given the circumstances. I could feel the gentle roughness of his mouth, the mild twitching of his jaw as his mandibles started to flutter, the vibration carrying into my chin from the restored purring rumbling out of his mouth and into mine. The only thing that pulled me out of the little trance he had put me in was the starting hum of the cannons about to fire again, causing me to regretfully part from him and grab his hands once more to pull him along to the science side of the ship where the brothers had left the doors unlocked.

“We should really move along, unless you wanna make a game of getting tossed around like that some more,” I said, starting to open the doors for us.

“No, I’d rather not have ‘died on because of recoil’ to my tombstone, thank you.”

Once the doors opened up, Ventrus eagerly followed me through. The doors closed just in time for another muffled boom to ring out, letting us know we got out just in time to not see Ven hilariously get shaken around the ship again. The brothers were huddled around another table displaying a hologram similar to the one in the Council’s chambers, only this one was much smaller and detailed what looked like the frequency of the radio signal and where it could be emanating from exactly in the tunnels.

“K’yarneth and… Vengeance, good to see you,” called out Triliek. Figures the rude one wouldn’t even remember Ven’s name.

“It’s Ventrus, brother,” corrected Tornin before looking back over to us. “Please, do come over. We have… a few things to discuss.”

Concerned, Ventrus and I looked at each other before approaching the brothers. Arthruuz was busy messing with the hologram’s information, but Tornin and Triliek were all too eager to chat us up about something seemingly important.

“What is it now?” I asked, both concerned and scared with how desperate their words seemed from the few sentences they’d spoken just after us entering the room.

“We think something’s going on here other than the Fer’yasai,” Triliek blurted first. “We know someone or a few people are behind all of this… but we think we might know who.”

“Don’t get their hopes up like that, brother,” retorted Tornin. “It’s only a theory but… we think that the Council might know more than they’re letting on to even us.”

“More than eager to send you and your partner out here along with the top scientists of the planet- and a small team of soldiers that couldn’t possibly stand up to a horde in the breeding grounds that the Fer’yasai came from. It’s just too suspicious unless they knew something we don’t.”

“I’ve felt the same, especially with the head Councilman being out to pick us up,” added Ventrus. “I was surprised he didn’t try and fight us in the elevator, in fact, I was hoping he would’ve, I’ve been dying to break his jaw ever since he started talking.”

“I’m starting to like this alien,” snickered Triliek before his laughter turned into a quick cough to put himself back on track with the conversation.

“I’ve… felt the same for a while now,” I said, leaning against the holotable in the room. “Minus the jaw-breaking part. I’d rather just fold him like laundry but that sounds satisfying too.”

Arthruuz stopped fiddling with the hologram and turned to address us, “We started coming up with a plan in case anything goes wrong in the caves. Whether it’s the Fer’yasai or… anyone else, like the paramilitary on the other side of the ship that is following the Council’s direct orders.”

“We’ll help however we can,” said Ventrus sincerely.

“I agree, if the Council or anyone else thinks they can mess with the most capable people on the planet, they’ve got another thing coming,” I added on.

“Good, because we were really counting on you specifically, Ventrus, for a big part of this,” said Tornin, making Ventrus look almost giddy with the excitement of being needed for something important again.

There was just one thing plaguing my mind- if the entire Council or even part of it is behind some plot against us… could my father be involved? It didn’t sit right with me, but something more had to be going on. I just had to hope that the truth wouldn’t force me into any uncomfortable circumstances.

The ship had landed and the doors opened up in front of us. The Marjini filed out one after the other before us, scouting the grounds out before we had a chance to step out ourselves. Ventrus and I went out first, Ven wanting a moment to survey the area himself a bit with his scanner before we all went ahead into the tunnels.

“So, find anything odd yet, Ven?” I asked, noticing him glancing around a lot at the soldiers and the landscape.

“It’s just weird to think that this used to be full of buildings,” he said weakly, kicking a pile of rubble at his feet. “It looks like that planet I found the thresher maws on - Akuze - but let’s hope there’s less of them here.”

“Or more preferably, none at all.”

“Speaking of which, I can’t see any of the ferals around here. I don’t know how recent the Council’s hologram was, but it showed this place swarming with them and now I can’t see a single one anywhere and I actually have eyes.”

The sounds of steps against the metallic ramp let us know that the scientists were approaching us next. We spun around as Tornin patted us both on the shoulder. “You two ready? Made sure your guns are loaded, Ventrus?”

“My guns are always loaded and ready to fire.”

“Ain’t that the truth,” I laughed, making Ven groan.

“Every time I try to sound cool in front of people you just have to go and embarrass me.”

“They’re nerds, they don’t even know what I’m talking about.”

“Hurtful,” Tornin replied before stepping back with his brothers. “But he’s right, is it some sort of alien thing- nevermind, it’s not important.”

A harsh, assertive cough for our attention made me jump, glancing over and seeing the likely commander of the squad, based on her being the only one that’s addressed us at all since we’ve seen them, stepping towards us. While the rest had the same uniform and facial coverings, this female had small wording along the side of her gun which she had out and ready to use as the rest of her squad. The lettering was Pamto Tomoja, or “all is one”, a common phrase for the Marjini that Brilxox came up with when it was established.

“We’re moving out, get in the middle and we’ll protect you. Don’t want a Councilman’s son and some respected stragglers dying in the caves, would we?” she asked sarcastically, the tone of her voice surprising to me. While xindraits tended to have synchronized pitches to their voice, something that allows us to mimic nearly any sound, hers was much deeper, almost distorted, and sounded like there was more of a growl behind it than real language. With a voice like that, no wonder she’s the only one allowed to speak; I’d be intimidated by that, too.

Ventrus looked uneasy with the situation for multiple reasons, but I let my hand come up and stroke the side of his mandible, surprising him and yet still immediately changing his demeanor into a slight bout of reassurance. The Marjini formed a circle around us, almost like a wall in case anything were to try and get past them and to us… though I couldn’t help but feel trapped inside of it. We moved together towards the entrance of the tunnels; the place where the invasion had officially started.

The entrance was more of a giant hole in the ground, leading down with a dirt ramp that implied either the Fer’yasai burrowed out at an angle or something made the ramp for them. The possibility of everything being staged only seemed more and more certain as we learned more about what was going on. The descent with the ramp was still rather large, a drop from the top to the bottom would have definitely hurt the bones, that’s for sure. But once we were inside, everything was eerily dug out. Not like some feral beasts had done it, instead more like a skilled team had purposely and smoothly dug it all out beforehand. Though the floors did look odd, made even more apparent by Ventrus’ gift of sight.

“The floors are covered in this… stuff,” he whispered, looking around at the entry of the tunnels. “Like tentacles but- they’re not alive, thank the spirits. And they’re just grey like they’re just drained of color.”

“Sounds like Fer’yasai behavior,” I replied. “They get their nutrients from the environment, whether it be the land or... now the people since they have a bustling new diet of civilians.”

“Now’s not the time for getting ourselves down, we need to find this beacon and then get out as soon as we can,” interrupted Tornin, who pulled out a small, palm-sized tracer from his robing. “This thing can show us how close we are to the signal, plus the frequency is actually working its own echolocation for us, so we should be able to get a pretty good idea of what paths to take to get there.”

“I thought you guys could hear really well,” stated Ven, seemingly confused. “Why can’t you guys hear this and track it yourselves?”

“The Fer’yasai are much more sensitive to noise than we are. So the signal is high enough in frequency that only they can hear it. All the more reason to believe it was made specifically to start their attack on Amarium.”

Tornin led us forward, his brothers and us following him as the Marjini continued to keep up their circle around us. The farther we got from the opening of the tunnels, the darker I knew it had to be for Ventrus who still needed light to see. A quiet clicking of a button on his chest and he sighed in relief, letting me know that at least his suit’s flashlight was working to help keep him calm now.

“Thank the Spirits for flashlights, I couldn’t imagine not being able to see in the…” he paused as we all turned towards him slowly.

“Oh, you don’t like being in the dark huh? I can’t imagine living like that,” I laughed, the brothers joining in as Ventrus cleared his throat and grumbled all dramatically until we stopped.

Eventually, we had followed the tunnels for what seemed like forever before coming to an odd section- a sort of clearing as the tracker started beeping, letting us know that the beacon had to be extremely close by now. But instead of walking with us, the Marjini suddenly stopped in their tracks, keeping us all in place.

“What’s the matter? Care to inform the actual science team what you’re all stopping for?” questioned Triliek, his voice raised in anger.

“K’yarneth, have you seen any signs of the Fer’yasai in here besides the floors?” Ven asked me in a whisper.

“No, nothing,” I answered, looking around the room as the soldiers began to turn to all face us directly. “I think the brothers were right, something isn’t right about any of this.”

We all jumped as suddenly the Marjini pointed their guns at us simultaneously, sending us all back-to-back in fear at the incredibly immediate threat before us. The same female soldier from before stepped away from the circle, approaching us once more.

“Ambassador, AUCE scientists… and turian. By order of the Creators…” she paused, pointing her cannon at me directly. “You are forbidden from leaving these tunnels until the all-seer has finished his mission.”

A wave of fear took over me, but then something else came to me- humor. A smile cracked at my lips and eventually, a chuckle turned into a round of laughter that the brothers and Ventrus joined in on.

“What’s so funny, Ambassador?” she asked in a demanding tone, that familiar growl of attitude in her voice.

“Nothing,” I said, my laughter trailing off as I edged closer to the back of the brother and they did the same. “I just can’t believe you threatened a team with a turian biotic on their side.”

As soon as I finished my sentence, we were wrapped in the protective field that only Ventrus could manage, shielding us from the fire of their Soti rifles. Looking over at him, Ventrus had the shield activated with a single hand, probably easy for him since we were all so close together and all he was having to block out was sound waves.

“Well, that went better than expected,” Triliek laughed as he and the other brother looked at the Marjini who were completely unable to harm us. “What about the second part of that plan though? I’d like to not have to worry about them for too much longer if you don’t mind.”

“Right, almost forgot,” remembered Ventrus as he used his free hand to reach at his belt pouch, pulling out a small canister before pulling the trigger on it and throwing it upwards, past the barrier. The outside of the barrier went white for a split second, and once we could see again, all of the soldiers were on the ground, writhing in pain.

Ventrus dropped the shield and pulled out his Phaeston rifle, quickly switching off the safety and pointing it at the nearest incapacitated soldier, “I’m still allowed to shoot them, right?”

“You’ve made sure the rest of the plan went through, sure,” I sighed, finding it almost disappointing how easy it was to take out the Council’s best soldiers with a simple flashbang grenade. “Just leave the commander alive, I have some personal questions to ask her. Hopefully, she agrees to talk once she can think again without that ringing in her ears.

Ventrus began systematically going to each soldier and emptying a few rounds into each of their faces, not even their faceplates quite enough to stop energy weapons from the Milky Way, apparently. Considering there were only nine soldiers without the commander, he made quick work of them before grabbing her by the back of her torso armor and pulling her up to her feet and securing her hands with his biotic strength. She struggled, slowly gaining her mental capability back before trying to lunge at Ventrus despite him being behind her to hold her.

I pulled the Scorpion pistol from my side holster and pressed the barrel into the front of her head, making her movements stop as she looked ahead straight at me.

“I’ll give you one chance because I’ve really started to lose my patience with this planet today,” I threatened, holding the trigger down slightly to start charging the shot. “Why does the Council want us dead, Commander?”

She tilted her head quickly, almost as if she was confused, “The Council is weak, just as you are. They’ll be healed just as the all-seer was.”

“Who is that? Who’s the all-seer?” I demanded, but instead of an answer she simply knocked her head backward into Ventrus, forcing him to release her. She let out a horrific shriek, sounding like a pained animal before charging towards me, but a shot to her body knocked her backward as her chest exploded in a rather dramatic manner before her body fell to the ground, finally still.

A round of applause from the scientists made me laugh as I went over and checked on Ventrus, making sure he didn’t get his face hurt from the backward headbutt he just took for me. But his face appeared fine and he confirmed for me that he wasn’t bleeding which reassured me.

He wrapped his long arms around me, letting out his own dramatic sigh with it as he buried his face into my neck, “Sorry for not being able to hold her, she hits almost as hard as Sky.”

“You’re fine… plus I think this means we’re officially even in terms of how many times we’ve saved each other’s lives.”

“Good, now can you just try to not die anymore, I’d really appreciate the lack of heart attacks you’ve been giving me every five minutes,” he joked as he pulled away from me. “You have some- uh, K’yarneth, xindrait blood isn’t black, right?”

“What, no, it’s purple. The only things with black blood are the…” I hesitated for a moment. “The Fer’yasai, but we haven’t fought any of them in a while.”

“Yeah, and this is fresh, K’yarn. But the only blood you’ve been around recently would have to be…” he paused as well, leading to the both of us to look over at the bodies of the dead Marjini. “Their blood is all black, K’yarn- but they’re just soldiers, why would…”

“Ventrus, can you take off the Commander’s helmet for me? I have a… theory.”

Ventrus followed the command, slowly stepping over to the body of the Commander. He wrestled with the strap attaching the helmet to her head before finally prying it loose and slowly taking it off of her. “Spirits,” was all Ven could get out as he stared, dropping the front part of the helmet down to the ground as he quickly rose back up and backed away from her corpse.

Where there should have been the smooth, human-like lips of a xindrait, there was only a row of needle-thin and razor-sharp teeth, unlike anything I’d seen before. Her nose was no longer there, instead now just two small holes. Even the skin of her cheeks had small lumps on them, each one sprouting what looked to be hair-length tendrils.

“She’s… she’s becoming a Fer’yasai,” I stuttered, genuinely taken aback for what felt like the millionth time since I’d been here.

“The mutations can’t be natural,” Arthruuz added, stepping forward to stand beside me. “This is something beyond our known science, nothing natural whatsoever. This mutation must’ve been forced… somehow.”

“The Council’s elite guard is suddenly mutated into some hybrid monsters and yet they still follow their command, they have to have known about this.”

“They don’t just follow the entire Council’s orders, K’yarneth. They follow the command of the lead Councilman.”

I clenched my fists tightly, feeling like my blood was boiling in a fit of rage at the mere thought of that man’s name. “Ventrus- you’re the military man here, what do you think we should do now?”

He looked around at the bodies for a minute before looking back at the scientists, “Boys, grab some guns, we’re still here to find that beacon no matter what.”

There was something so heroic about seeing him take charge like that, it almost made me wish I could've seen him in action back in the Milky Way when he was part of an actual military instead of a single soldier with the Andromeda Initiative.

“What then?” asked Tornin as he stepped over a dead body to bend down and grab their rifle. “We can shut down the beacon, but what do we do since we’re technically supposed to be dead now?”

“I’ll let K’yarneth answer that one,” Ventrus said, coming over beside me as he handed me the Commander’s own rifle to use. I put my pistol back away and held the special Soti in my hands, getting a good feel for it before speaking.

“It’s very simple, actually. We’ll just take the warship back to Seijasa,” I answered as the brothers lined back up in front of us, all now with their own Sotis. “And then I’ll personally take pleasure in blowing Brilxox’s head off of his fucking shoulders.”


	6. Devious Ambitions

“You’re not gonna get it open that way,” I groaned out loud as the brothers tried their best to work their technological magic on the blockade in front of us.

Before us was a break from the rocky walls we had seen so far. The grey, dried stone and tendril-like masses connected to a metallic wall, blocking us with a door that was closed tight and no way to unlock it naturally available.

“The signal is definitely coming from right behind this door, the beacon has to be in there,” stated Arthruuz, looking down at his scanner. “We could try and hack it open but there’s not even any sort of controls to-”

“Don’t worry, I got this,” interrupted Ventrus as his body’s shape went blurry which meant his biotic aura was flaring to life. “I have a friend like you guys back in my galaxy, always wants to hack into stuff when he can. But sometimes it’s easier to just brute-force stuff.”

A small sound of struggle and suddenly the doors popped open like it was nothing. Ventrus’ body became clear again as he arrogantly cracked his knuckles before standing to the side of the door and gesturing for us to go in like we were allowed to now. Arthruuz and Tornin went inside quickly, but Triliek gave him a twisted expression that was quickly alleviated by me shoving him into the room with his brothers.

“Good job, Ven,” I laughed as I watched the brothers circle around what must’ve been the object that was broadcasting the signal. “Room’s kinda cramped- mind staying out here with me?”

“Sure, just keep me out here in the dark, scary cave with nothing but my flashlight and a blind man, no problem.”

“Hey, you made it with us this far, we’ve been walking for a good half hour without the Marjini. You’ve done a great job protecting us so far.”

“Half hour with no ferals in sight… it still all has me beyond uneasy.”

“K’yarneth, you might wanna come in here and look at this,” I heard Arthruuz call out from the room.

“Duty calls, try not to let any monsters sneak up on you, please,” I giggled to Ventrus who seemed slightly less amused than me,

Walking into the small, metallic room, it was evident that the only purpose it served was to protect whatever was broadcasting the signal. The beacon looked to be nothing more than a tablet hinged to a pole coming from the ground, very simplistic in design for sure.

“So… you guys needed me to see this for what reason?” I asked, confused as to what was important enough for me to see.

“Well, for starters, this isn’t modern Amarium technology,” answered Arthruuz. “This is easily pre-Transmutation Day tech… maybe some parts from when we first started exploring more? Either way, I’ve never seen anything like it in my past century of life that I can remember.”

“Not only that, but it’s still beyond our level to even crack,” Tornin added with a sigh. “This thing has high-level encryption, only officials are meant to get past this stuff… officials like Councilmembers.”

“Of course they’re involved,” I groaned in aggravation. “What can you guys do about it then?”

“We could just smash it,” Triliek suggested first. “But this thing’s signal is actually deterring the Fer’yasai, this could literally be what caused the invasion.”

“But… this is old tech,” I replied. “So wouldn’t that mean that this would have had to have been here for centuries?”

“Yeah, so this wasn’t a spur-of-the-moment plan, this has been in the works for almost a millennium by now.”

“And as for now, shutting this thing down would just put us in danger,” Tornin interjected. “The Fer’yasai haven’t bothered us because they were pushed out by this thing. If we destroy it, I doubt we’d even be able to get back onto the ship before they swarmed back to their home base here.”

“We could take it with us,” Ventrus interjected, leaning in from the threshold of the room. “Back in the Milky Way, my team and I found a beacon on another planet that served a different purpose, but we took some of the information with us to study. So maybe we can take that little transmitter with us to give ourselves a shield from those things.”

“That could work, actually,” guessed Arthruuz. “Triliek- we might need your brute force to pull this off.”

“Oh, absolutely. It’d be my pleasure.”

“You nerds have fun in here, try not to blow anything up,” I snickered as I stepped back outside of the room.

Ventrus was typing away at his Omni-Tool, but since I couldn’t really see it, it was a bit difficult to know exactly what he was doing on it. He must’ve noticed me looking over at him because he quickly looked to me before explaining what he was typing.

“I’m keeping a journal of everything that’s been going on. Figured that best-case scenario, it serves as a badass reminder of everything we did. And the worst-case scenario… at least I got it down that we went out doing our damnedest to stop the ferals from winning.”

“I can promise you we’re making off of this planet soon enough. We just gotta go beat some sense into a few politicians and then hopefully we’ll be off.”

The two of us laughed together before a small tremor shook the caves, causing a few pebbles of rock to fall from the ceiling. I turned back to look inside the beacon room and saw Triliek with a piece of the device in his hand, as well as the other brothers looking surprised by what just happened as Arthruuz pulled his scanner back out.

“Did you guys do that?” I asked with a hint of disappointment in my voice. “Please tell me these caves aren’t gonna collapse on us now.”

“As soon as we got it off, the ground shook and-” Tornin tried to say before Arthruuz cut him off with a harsh realization.

“Guys… it was an explosion,” he said grimly. “In Seijasa- something big just happened and I wouldn’t doubt if it was directly related to the beacon.”

“Then it looks like we just alter the plan a little,” suggested Ventrus. “We head back, see what’s going on with all of this, then continue with the beating-up part of it.”

The brothers quickly gathered their weapons and headed back out of the room, but I managed to snag the beacon, now just a palm-sized screen, out of Triliek’s hands without too much of a hassle. After all, he seemed to be about the least-trustable one to hold important technology, I wouldn’t even trust him to carry a piece of glass without having the spontaneous urge to smash it against the ground.

Ventrus and I led the brothers again like we had the entire way here, which was a surprisingly fun position to find myself in since the best example of a leadership role I’ve had in my life was at the Embassy and even there I was under the thumb of the Council and the Initiative’s Director. But Ventrus seemed so in-place like this. The echoing of the walls helped me see his face better and he just looked so… stoic. It almost made me wish I could’ve seen him in his prime back during his days in the Milky Way, now the fate of the planet resides in the hands of an old xindrait and his alien gun-nut of a boyfriend.

\----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The brothers did a pretty decent job at flying the ship back to Seijasa, though the frequent rocking made it apparent that they spent more time in their lab than actually flying off anywhere. Ven and I were standing at the entryway, waiting for the ship to begin the landing process which went much smoother than expected. The monotone ring of the ship’s speakers made it clear we had officially landed, but then the ship suddenly shifted as if whatever we landed on sank or collapsed partly.

The warship was still standing, at least, but why would the ground on Seijasa crumble beneath unless something was terribly wrong with the landing area. Arthruuz was the first to come out from the front of the ship, the worried frown on his lips telling me something was definitely wrong that only he and his brothers could have seen with the radars up front.

The second the doors opened, I couldn’t help but rush out and onto the uneven ground. It was apparent what was wrong now: Seijasa was in absolute ruin. The ground was broken and cracked, entire sections stuck up and jagged as if something exploded underneath the entire block while we were gone. And then that’s when I noticed it - Seriseifu was no longer standing, either. The building was collapsed, chunks of its concrete and steel scattered everywhere, making it apparent that whatever happened occurred right underneath the structure itself.

Though it was too far for me to be able to see, I could sense rustling amongst the rubble. Less like Fer’yasai scuttering and more like… actual footsteps. I looked back at Ventrus who was already pulling his rifle out and gave me an affirmative nod that he’d be right behind me. We took off towards the sound, managing to make it over the broken ground without too much trouble, Making sure to stop behind a large boulder before we encountered what it was that I heard.

I withdrew my pistol from its holster slowly and Ventrus stayed close to me, waiting for my word. I took a deep breath and lunged out from the cover, Ven rolling out behind me ready to shoot anything hostile. But instead, all we got was something possibly even more dangerous than the ferals at this point: the Councilmembers.

The members all looked hurt but relatively okay, likely able to have healed themselves from most of their scrapes in the time that it took us to get here. Ven and I kept our weapons trained on them as they all notably looked at us in shock… all except for Ait-aama, who stood up slowly before approaching us with a hand holding a bandaged part of her stomach.

“K’yarneth! You’re okay!” she exclaimed as she rushed over to me, locking me into a hug around my neck before I could even react. “Dad and I were so worried, we found out about what happened and-”

“Found out what?” I asked harshly as I backed away from her arms. “You mean the part where the Council tried to send us to our deaths? Or the part where they decided to start mutating their own citizens?”

I didn’t know if I actually had it in me to fire at any of the Council- I’d know most of them my entire life and… my father standing there like the rest of the Council, looking just as confused as we did about all this.

The sound of running footsteps behind us turned out to be the three brothers who had finally managed to catch up to us. Tornin quickly came to my side and put his hand on my pistol, making me slowly lower it away from the Council. I still didn’t trust them fully but… I feel like blowing up half the planet at this point is a little drastic for them to even think about pulling off. As my weapon dropped, Ventrus followed along and lowered his as well until we both decided to put our weapons away fully.

I gazed around at the rest of the Council but noticed the head of it was missing, “Where’s Brilxox? We need to have a little chat.”

My father was the first to step forward, “He attacked Ait and then stole one of the Council shuttles. Luckily Ait was able to get us out before everything just…”

“Exploded. Yeah, tends to be a habit of buildings around here, doesn’t it?” added Ventrus as he started scanning some of the rubble with his Omni-Tool.

“I found out his plans after hack- happening to find his open files on his room’s holotable,” said Ait, stuttering to correct herself in front of the Council, though not like it mattered much now.

“Yeah, we got a good idea of what he was planning too,” I replied as I pulled the beacon from a pocket under my robes. “The Marjini that were sent to accompany us? Turns out they were mutated with some sort of combination of Fer’yasai. They were supposed to kill us but luckily Ventrus here was able to take care of them.”

“You’d be surprised how easily a lot of things go down with enough ammo,” he laughed as he began venturing off to do some more scanning towards the initial area where the explosion should’ve happened.

“Well, what else did you find out? Any idea where he took the ship to?”

“His notes had a lot of information about Oja, I think he plans on doing… something there.”

“Oja? You mean our smallest moon? But we haven’t even been there since-”

“Transmutation Day,” interjected my father, stepping forward to be beside Ait-aama. “We’ve stayed away for a reason, K’yarneth. The Council swore that we wouldn’t return after-”

“The Council’s sworn a lot of things, father, including to keep the people here safe.”

“K’yarneth- it’s not safe there! You know that!” he exclaimed.

“Could anyone maybe explain what’s wrong with our moon to the actual scientists that have been left in the dark about this for the past few centuries?” said Triliek with a strong hint of attitude in his voice.

“It’s our smallest moon but it’s not really desolate like a moon should be. It was originally another colonized planet- so I’m assuming it’s full of Fer’yasai like the other colonies farther away are,” I answered coldly, not liking what the words coming out of my mouth meant for us.

“So… Brilxox is off on a planet full of Fer’yasai and we don’t know, but we’re pretty sure he also decided to try and wipe out his entire home planet? That doesn’t make any sense, there has to be more,” questioned Arthruuz as he rubbed the sides of his faceplate in aggravation.

“And I know exactly how to get the answers that we need. The ship still works, right?”

“You don’t mean- K’yarneth, that’s suicide! We can’t just take a battleship like that into space, it’d be torn apart before we even breached the atmosphere!”

“He’s right, K’yarneth, you’d never make it on that thing...” Ait chimed in, drifting off towards the end of her thoughts. “But… maybe we could take another ship- I don’t think he would’ve been able to destroy the Council’s personal ships and those can actually handle flight through space. Though usually, it’s for escape, not flying right into a warzone.”

“Then that’s the only hope we have so far. Ventrus and I can-”

“You can’t fly that thing, K’yarn. Only Councilmembers can… or anyone they might’ve taught to fly the ships for them.”

“You- Ait, I can’t let you fly us there, you’d be putting yourself in an incredible amount of danger.”

“I guess it’s a good thing I’m not asking your permission then, huh? C’mon, this is personal now! Dude literally had the audacity to jab me in the gut with one of his tendrils after I caught him, I owe him something in return.”

As much as I hated the idea of forcing her to come, none of the Council was exactly stepping forward to volunteer themselves and the brothers were, for lack of a better term, useless in actual combat so asking them to come was just asking them to get themselves killed.

“Fine, you can come,” I huffed as I dragged my hand down the lower half of my face. “Can you get the ship ready for us? I’m gonna go ahead and grab Ventrus and meet you in the landing bay- or at least at what’s left of it.”

With that, we both went off in different directions. It didn’t take too long to find Ventrus who was perched up on a boulder while typing on his Omni-Tool, probably trying to catalog his scans to be nice and neat so he could commemorate this mess of a trip.

“Come on, Ventrus, we got a new ride to catch up to Brilxox.”

“Oh, sounds fun, he said as he slid from the top of the rock to the ground, dusting off his armor slightly afterward. “Where are we going now? More cave-exploring? Oh, tell me it has some romantic lighting.”

“No, Kishantey, we’re going to one of our old colonized moons. Ait is taking us there on a Council ship.”

“I- Spirits, I hope she can fly in space calmer than you. I swear I was in more danger in the shuttle here with you than I have been the entire time on this planet.”

“Well luckily for you, she’s actually trained to fly a more complicated trip. I just like pressing buttons and it usually works.”

“At least this should be pretty easy with that beacon on us, right? Get in there, find Brilxox’s slimy ass, then replace his torso with a gaping hole and we should be all good.”

The two of us laughed it off as we trudged through the rubble to get to the other end of the block, not more than a couple of minutes worth of a walk. Once there, we could see Ait already standing by the ship along with my father. Ait was talking to him but quickly went back up into the ship as Hirzih turned to us as we got closer.

“K’yarneth! Ventrus! The two heroes of Amarium,” he joked with a smile on his face. “I’m… sorry you two are having to deal with all this on your own.”

“We’ve managed fine so far,” Ven replied before me. “Though I’m glad the whole Council isn’t evil, it would’ve been a bummer to have to come here and blow everyone up… then again I guess Brilxox took care of that for us so-”

“Alright, Ventrus, why don’t you go on inside the ship, get fastened in up front with Ait?” I asked, not wanting him to accidentally talk himself into a hole.

Once he made his way into the ship, I felt my father put his hands on my shoulders. It reminded me of when Ait was younger and he would try and calm her down during a tantrum. Only this time for me it felt more like he was about to try and calm me down before we went on a heartattack of a mission with the literal fate of my people on the line.

“K’yarneth… I’m so proud of you,” he said with dryness in his throat, making his voice sound slightly raspy. “Take care of your sister, okay? We’re gonna be staying here and hopefully be able to do some more digging with whatever data we can scavenge from Brilxox’s records. Arthruuz said you guys had a beacon to repel the ferals and a transmitter- so hopefully we’ll be in touch with some useful info soon.”

“Thank you, Dad. And I’m sure she’ll be able to take care of herself just fine once that little wound heals up on her. In fact, I’m just surprised it hasn’t healed yet already.”

“It’s probably just stress keeping her from focusing on it. Just… keep her safe for me? For us. Her and your alien friend in there. I gotta admit, now that he’s not here, I didn’t think your type would include someone with more body plating than even us-”

“Alright, Dad, that’s enough-”

“He’s very lean. Oh, is that why you like him? Is he bendy-”

“Dad, at this point I’d rather be mauled by a Fer’yasai than continue talking about this.”

A hearty laugh from him and suddenly the shoulder hold went into a full hug with his arms fully holding on to me around my own. Our faceplates clinked together and I nervously tried to slither out of it once I heard the soft giggling of a turian from inside the ship.

“We should really get going, Dad. We’ll try to keep in touch soon, probably try to send our first call once we land, if that works.”

“I’ll tell the other to expect it soon then!” he exclaimed as I stepped up onto the ship, activating the mechanism to close the ramp behind me. “I love you, Kid, hoshyta kukoni! You get out there and teach that old man not to mess with Amarium!”

I couldn’t help but laugh at his infectious enthusiasm, “I love you too, try not to blow up any more buildings while we’re gone. I’d like there to at least be some flat land for us to land on once we get back.”

He chuckled again and waved at me before the doors finally closed on the ship. I sighed and made my way to the front of the ship where the cockpit tends to be with most ships. This was the same model of the shuttle like the one we took to Seijasa when Brilxox was aboard with us, so at least I trusted Ait to be able to fly it and it’d be the first thing that hasn’t been a brand new experience to Ventrus yet.

The two of them were already sitting and strapped into their seats, Ait starting the ship’s liftoff while Ventrus patted the arm of the seat next to him, inviting me over. I quickly took my lace, leaning back in the seat to take a breath before Ventrus shyly put his hand in the space between our seats, practically begging for me to hold it. I buckled in and let him perk him up by holding onto his hand, interlocking my fingers between his as the ship began to rise from the ground.

“You losers ready to get going? I got this baby ready to jump Oja for us in no time flat,” she said with a wicked grin.

“Ventrus, you ready? I know you didn’t quite like warp speed on the ride here.”

“I can handle it! I think it’d be the tamest thing to deal with since we got here.”

“Don’t place your bets just yet, turian,” Ait snickered as she shifted her hands over the console, suddenly throwing the ship forward with enough force to hold us back into our seats

I was used to this by now, in fact, this was mild compared to how fast Ait liked to fly around space. Ventrus was putting on his bravest face but I could see his eyes nervously darting around while his hand clenched onto mine.

“This is g-great!” he blurted out nervously, his body looking stiff in an attempt to keep his composure.

Ait-aama and I both let out a round of laughter noticing Ventrus, but I made sure to let go of his hand and instead brush it against the side of his face. He instinctively leaned into it without hesitation.

“You’ll be just fine, Ventrus. Ait and I will make sure of it.”

In literal seconds, the ship’s speed died down to a crawl as we approached what I could only assume was Oja, our long-former moon colony. Ait was running scans of the area below us to try and find a clear spot for us to land.

“I got something, just big enough for us to touch down at. You two should get ready in case there are any stragglers that hear the ship coming down.”

“I have the beacon in my robes still so those little fucks shouldn’t be a problem. But if there are… we got them, right Ventrus?”

Ven was still shooken-up from the ride, trembling as I undid my seatbelt and he gave me a shaky thumbs-up. I stood and stretched my arms out before offering my hand out to him. He started to fiddle with his straps when suddenly the ship rocked in the air like something smacked up against it.

“What was that, Ait?” I asked her, watching her frantically fiddle with the console.

“Unknown… I’m reading a lot of lifeforms around us. They’re mainly backing away as we approach, but apparently some of them are frantic enough to-” she was cut off as another, larger hit really rocked us. “-to start attacking us.”

“What can we do? Can’t you just shoot them off or something?” Ventrus asked frantically.

“This is a Council ship, not a gunner. Best I can do is send out a few sound pulses to send them off for a bit but that uses the ship’s power and trust me, we’ll want to conserve it as much as possible.”

“Then… we just take them out ourselves,” I said coldly, smacking Ventrus shoulder pad. “Get ready Ven, looks like we’re gonna have to-” I tried to speak but was cut off again as a third, final hit knocked the ship around. I fell to the ground while the ship’s alarms began blaring, alerting us that the ship was for sure damaged with whatever the last attack just did to us.

My stomach lurched as the shuttle spun around over and over again, closer and closer to the ground. I couldn’t stand myself up, just clinging to the part of the floor as best I could to avoid getting thrown around like a ragdoll. I could see Ventrus reach out to me. I tried to reach my hand out to him, hoping I could reach him, but the ship came to an extreme halt as we hit the ground. The sounds of the metal hull crunching into the earth were cut short as the halt threw me forward. The non-covered area on the back of my head went first, slamming into the metal hard enough to leave me almost completely disoriented, not able to see anything, and only having the constant sound of ringing filling my ears.


	7. Revelations

Still unable to make anything out properly, all I could really manage was hearing Ait-aama and Ventrus panicking around me. Ait was near the sounds of the console beeping, so I assumed she was trying to figure out how to get us back into the air since my head can say we definitely crashed. Meanwhile, Ven’s blurry outline was hovering above me and I could feel him trying to lift me up as he was kneeling on the ground beside me.

I was able to set myself up with a little help from Ven cradling me. I rubbed the back of my head with a wince of pain, but I didn’t feel any blood and my vision was quickly coming back to me, so at least I knew nothing too serious had happened, or at least nothing I couldn’t heal from thanks to xindrait genes.

The ship was rocking with metallic banging as the Fer’yasai outside were trying to bash their way in. These Council ships weren’t built extra sturdy to survive nearly anything like the heftier ships we used on Amarium, so I had no doubt we were just barely safe for now and I’d guess enough beating at the door would eventually weaken it. And these things had no reason to leave us alone so quickly. I rummaged in my pocket for the beacon and found it easily. The palm-sized device was still in one piece… but it wasn’t working anymore for some reason.

“What’s going on with the beacon, K’yarn? We kinda need it if we don’t wanna get torn apart by these things,” Ait stammered out as she continued trying to get the console operational.

“I don’t know- this might be older tech but it’s still fully intact… I need to get a message through to the brothers, they’d be the only ones that would know what to do.”

“Alright, just… make it quick, I’ll connect you through to him with the console. That much should work still at least,” she replied as she stood up and started trying to activate the transmitter panel of the console.

The banging outside was only getting louder and harsher as the ferals seemed to be growing more violent with their attempts to get in.

“The ship isn’t gonna last long, K’yarn. This is a personal cruiser, not a warship; it wasn’t meant to take hits like this, let alone survive a crash landing,” Ait blurted out nervously.

“We have to make sure they don’t get in,” Ven said out loud as he slowly let go of me to stand himself up. “Ait… how well do you know how to use a gun?”

“Uh, never used one before, actually. But I’m sure it’s easy enough to aim the thing, right? Especially if K’yarn can manage to do it.”

“Take this, it’s about the most basic weapon I have unless you think you can handle some real kickback,” he said, handing Ait his own HMWP Pistol he had kept from his time in the Milky Way- that thing didn’t pack as much of a punch as the Scorpion he’d given me but fired faster which would come in handy, I’m sure.

“This’ll be fine, just point and boom, they’re done for. Thanks,” she said as she admired the weapon, trying to get a proper feel of it before she had to start using it. “What about you? You’re ready to use that weird bionic thing after the caves already?”

“It’s ‘biotic’- and yeah, should be. I just need to take a nap after we get off this moon.”

The two of them readied themselves at the door, Ven’s aura flaring to life as he pulled the Phaeston from his back and Ait was trying to get a comfortable two-handed grip on the pistol. She started to open the door via a panel next to it while Ventrus continued charging up, his body’s outline fully in an unsettling blur. His power was terrifying but… magnificent.

“Ready, Ventrus?”

“Open the door, let’s make sure these things don’t bust up the ship anymore.”

With a smile, she pressed the button of the panel and the door slid open, an immediate horde of tentacles entering the threshold. But the barbaric mass was met with a harsh pulse of Ventrus’ energy, making them disappear due to what I could only assume was literal disintegration. Then he immediately hopped out of the ship and started firing wildly. I could hear a chuckle come from Ait as well as a deep breath of preparation, then she followed behind him and I could hear her gun going off too. It was almost cute how well they were getting along.

“Hello? Ait-aama? K’yarneth?” Arthruuz’s voice questioned from the console in front of me, causing me to get myself into the pilot seat.

“Yeah, it’s K’yarneth. We had a bit of an issue landing. We’re fine but I need your help, the beacon isn’t working.”

“Isn’t- what do you mean? Destroyed? Malfunctioning?”

“No power, it;s just off. I think maybe the power is just drained since it was running on a more ancient power source so it died really quickly.”

“Shit… wait, where’s Ait and the alien?”

“They’re… keeping busy. But if you could help me out like, now, it’d be appreciated.”

There was a brief pause as quiet mumbling came from the other side, “You can recharge it- I’d suggest an outlet but there aren’t any on the ships… the console!”

“I’m sorry, what about the console?”

My thought process was cut off by a loud thudding into the ground outside, followed by Ait’s laughter. She was enjoying herself a little too much… good for her. I laughed at how different she is compared to when I left all those years ago, but the laugh just made my head hurt; apparently the damage was fixed but the headache was gonna loom for a while.

“K’yarneth? There should be a small panel on the top right section in front of you- open it up, there should be some wires there you can cut that’ll give you enough power to charge the thing.”

“Cut wires? Wouldn’t that like, fuck up the ship?”

“It’d shut down a few non-essential parts of the console. You’ll still be able to get back to Amarium no problem, I promise.”

“Shit… you better be right, Arthruuz, this plan sucks,” I groaned, opening up the small metallic door in the corner of the control panel before shaping the tip of my finger to a point, letting me cut through the wires without much of a problem.

A harsh thud rocked the ship and made me turn around in surprise. A Fer’yasai had made it inside the ship somehow and was staring me down… figuratively, of course. I quickly went for my pistol but was interrupted by a round of quick gunfire that took the beast down without hesitation. Then Ait poked her head inside the ship

“You good in here? Any more of them manage to sneak up on you?”

“I’m fine, almost done in here… having fun out there?”

“Yeah, no wonder why you like going on missions with this guy so much; killing bad things is ridiculously fun.”

“Alright, well I’m glad you’re enjoying murder so much. But if you could maybe keep helping Ventrus while I finish this…?” I asked her, leaving her to nod in agreement before heading back out to kill some more of the ferals.

Once the wires were free, the objective seemed simple: make sure the charge gets into the port at the bottom of the beacon. Luckily it was as simple as getting the wires inside which immediately made the beacon power up with an extremely loud, blaring alarm that rocked my head for a second even more than it already was. The ship’s lights flickered temporarily and the beacon stopped being at my hearable frequency, followed by a soft ding which I figured meant it was charged. I carefully removed the wires from the device and heard the delightful shrieking of the Fer’yasai retreating outside

“Hey, thanks Arthruuz… Arthruuz?” I looked at the comm confused, pressing the buttons rapidly before realizing the comms must’ve been one of the “non-essential” features he mentioned.

I stood back up and put my hand on my pistol, getting ready to pull it out in case all those things weren’t gone yet. Walking over the metal flooring and finally stepping out, coming down a foot or two before my feet hit the firm ground of the moon.

Other than the mass amount of dead Fer’yasai everywhere, the place didn’t seem like a moon at all; in fact, it was as lush as an entire jungle planet. The clearing we were in was mostly dirt, but everything around it as far as I could see was grass-floored with trees that reached into the sky. And the air felt cleaner, smoother than that of Amarium- the ferals must’ve somehow done this to the moon but… why?

A shriek of a feral shocked me, but not as much as what I actually saw: Ventrus was straddling the top of one like an animal, the thing thrashing about as he laughed. He raised one of his hands hammered down into the thing’s head, causing a shockwave that blew my clothes like a light wind. The beast fell as it appeared its head had exploded open, allowing Ven to roll off the top of it and almost tripping as he got to his feet.

He was closeby, trudging along as he put the rifle into the holster on his back. He slumped over into my chest, purring, and was obviously beyond exhausted at this point. I wrapped my arms under his to keep him up since he was mostly just dead weight, but Ait-aama was laughing her head off at the sight. I was able to help him walk back to the entrance of the ship and sit him down on the entrance, sitting with him and letting him rest his head against my shoulder.

“Ait-aama, you can keep that gun, by the way,” Ventrus mumbled out as he messed with the ammo pouch around his waist and tossed it to her. “Just remember to turn the safety on, don’t want you accidentally shooting yourself tonight.”

“Fine, fine, but you gotta teach me how to actually use this thing once we get back to Amarium. Dad’s gonna be so worried,” she chuckled as she attached the ammo belt to her waist, then slid the pistol into its little holster on the side.

“You need to change your bandages, by the way, you got feral blood on them.”

“Ugh, that’s disgusting. My thanks to your eyes, I suppose. I wish the cut would just heal already,” she grunted, coming up to the ship entrance and scooting by the two of us to go in.

“What’d you even get hit by, Ait?” I asked her, leaning my head back to watch as she investigated under the console for the first aid kit.

“Brilxox, that old kofu, stabbed me with one of his fucking tendrils. I’m surprised he didn’t sprain something trying to actually use them.”

“Wow, Ait, you’re probably the first xindrait in almost two centuries to get penetrated by Brilxox,” I laughed, warranting a smack to the back of my head as her own tendril slithered out in revenge.

“Literally, shut the fuck up or else the Fer’yasai are gonna be the second-most dangerous thing here. Just let me clean this up, I’m sure it’ll be healed up by tomorrow at the latest.”

I looked around at the treescape in front of the ship. It was odd how peaceful it looked- knowing what was hidden behind it all, monsters festering and waiting for their chance to attack. We should be safe from them for now, at least. With that beacon up and running more charged-up than ever, I doubt we’ll be in any immediate danger for a long while.

“Spirits, this much black looks terrible on my armor,” Ven grumbled beside me, shaking a clump of Fer’yasai off of his shoulder pad.

“At least you’re still bleeding blue instead of black, Ventrus,” I smiled, kissing him on his scratched-up fringe that he must’ve gotten from the little scuffle he had.

He nuzzled up against me more, his purring getting louder until his mouth opened wide for a yawn, “It was fun taking those things out with your sister. Your family is just full of natural killers- remember that kett warship you went on for your first mission?”

“You mean when I saved you and the Pathfinder from dying? Yeah.”

“I meant the one where you got shot in the face and it left a gash in your fat-ass faceplate.”

“Alright you two, enough bickering, my head can’t handle it,” Ait interrupted as she hopped back out of the ship, checking the fresh bandages to make sure they were secured well. “I got some bad news though, guys.”

“That sounds great… what’s going on?” I asked with disappointment in my voice.

“Well, you got the beacon powered which saved our lives… but in the process, it drained the ship’s battery a LOT. We can’t use it to investigate the planet anymore if we want to use it to get home. We got about ten minutes of flight or a quick jump left in it. Other than that… yeah, we can’t use it anymore.”

Ventrus and I both groaned at the same time, Ven being as dramatic to fully just fall back into the ship, leaving his legs dangling over the edge as he sprawled his arms out behind me. I patted his chest before grunting and looking around again. The sky was getting dark already, nightfall wasn’t too far off and I’d absolutely hate to be caught out in that forest at night no matter how “safe” we were.

I pulled out the beacon and used the scanner to view around as far as it could. There was a lot of Fer’yasai around, but there seemed to be some other reading coming from the East a ways away from us.

“I say we camp out here for the night,” I suggested to them. “It’s the safest place for now plus it has a bed we can sleep in, and I feel like we need the sleep… especially the little guy down here on the floor.”

“I am not little… but I’ll gladly accept the sleep, if you guys don’t mind,” Ven murmured from the floor.

“Go take your armor off, buddy. Ait and I will take care of the campsite, you earned some sleep for now, Ventrus.”

“Well, I won’t argue with that,” he snickered as he rolled around to get on all fours, then stood himself up from there and yawned again. “If the ferals come back, just yell. I’ll be there to save you in a couple hours.”

“Goodnight, Ventrus!” Ait and I said at the same time. Ventrus was a hardworking soldier but sometimes I wish he didn’t take the turian motto of ‘squad over self’ to heart and leave himself exhausted like this.

I looked over and as soon as the door to the bedroom closed, I could hear the clanking of Ventrus pulling his armor off piece by piece, then the soft springing of him literally falling into the sheets.

“Sorry if he takes up the entire bed on us. He’s scrawny but he sprawls.”

“It’s fine, I think I’ll stay in the cockpit tonight with the beacon anyway. Someone should be keeping guard and you two should get one last decent rest together before we go off on this crazy-ass hunting mission.”

“Well… I suppose you can go ahead and take it then, yeah?” I asked rhetorically as I tossed the device over to her. She caught it and studied it, making sure she knew how to use it before she let me get away.

“Alright, go join your alien friend in there. I think he’d appreciate the cuddling. I’ll head to the front and close up the shuttle doors; don’t wanna risk anything getting in.”

I put my arms out for a hug which Ait initially laughed off, but eventually came over to the ship and hugged me back, letting me pull her up to the inside with me. We both stood up from there and smiled at each other, shoving each of us to our sides of the ship with a laugh before reluctantly heading off. I could hear Ait use the panel to close the ship door, reassuring me we would be safe for the night.

Stepping into the room, the first thing I could notice was all of Ventrus’ armor piled up in the corner. Ven himself was under the covers with his face buried in the pillows, already snoring but luckily muffled through them. While I couldn’t exactly remove a layer as Ven did with his armor, I was able to finally take off my boots which were absolutely killing me after wearing them and walking around half of Amarium today. I put them in the opposite corner of Ven’s things, then removed the pistol from my hip and placed it gently on the end table next to the bed.

I crawled into the ed from the seemingly more-empty side, sliding under the covers and accidentally waking Ventrus up. His deep inhale and blinky eyes as his head rose up was almost as adorable as him immediately turning to his side and backing his body into mine.

“Well, someone was desperate to cuddle,” I smiled as I wrapped my arm around his thin waist and kissed him on his neck.

“You just… make it easier to sleep,” he rationalized while he moved his head to give mine space to maneuver. “ Plus we both know you like holding onto me at night.”

“You know what would make it even easier to sleep?” I rumbled, moving my hand down his side, feeling the fabric of the undersuit he was wearing under his armor and to be.

“You don’t- K’yarn, you can’t be serious.”

“Since when haven’t I been serious about you and your ridiculously grabbable hips?”

He groaned but his rapid purring did a terrible job at helping to cover up how he was feeling. He turned his head to the side and leaned up to kiss me, eventually turning his whole body until his arms were around my neck and he found himself on his back below me.

“K’yarneth… you’re the absolute worst,” he laughed, not letting me go.

“I love you too, Ventrus,” I snickered as I leaned my head back down to his, letting my hands grip his waist as his body tensed in anticipation.

\---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I woke up slowly, the sound of shuffling outside the door mildly alarming me. The first thing I did was look over at the door itself which was still locked. Ven was in my arms, fast asleep and letting out light purrs with every exhale.

Instead of waking him up to help me investigate, I decided to slowly crawl out from behind him. To avoid making too much noise, I opted to keep my shoes off and hesitantly grabbed my pistol in case anything undesirable had gotten inside the ship.

The door opened quietly and I was met with a cold chill of the outside air. I pointed the gun out after noticing the cruiser’s doors were fully opened, but the more alarming thing I noticed was a trail on the floor of some sort of liquid - that I could only assume was blood - leading from the cockpit and out through the doors.

Worriedly, I hurried to the cockpit and opened the doors. I was filled with chagrin at the realization Ait-aama wasn’t in the pilot seat, nor in the cockpit at all. The only thing in there was another small splatter of blood but with something in this one.

It was on the floor, a small puddle with the semi-rectangular objects in it- quite a few of them actually. I carefully picked one up to examine it and just as quickly dropped it once I realized what they were: teeth. And xindrait teeth for sure - these had to be Ait’s but… fuck, why would she do this? Something was beyond wrong and I needed to investigate.

The pistol she got from Ventrus wasn’t in here but the beacon was sitting on the console. I grabbed it and popped it into my pocket again to make sure I wasn’t possibly walking into danger outside the ship which is where I headed immediately next. I closed the cruiser doors behind me to make sure nothing could get inside while Ventrus was asleep.

The trail of blood was minor out here but still stood out from the grass and dirt relatively well which made it easy to follow. It led me down into the treeline where I continued on as quietly as possible. The environment was eerily quiet, not a single disturbance in an earshot which was strange since they’d been staying close to us all this time since we’d been here.

The longer I walked around, the more terrified I found myself. Pointing the Scorpion at the slightest sounds I made up in my head, my breathing getting heavier as my heartbeat picked up. But then I heard the first familiar thing since I’d been out here: breathing. It was from the lungs of a xindrait for sure but… something was off. I knew it had to be Ait, but what could have happened to her for her to get all the way out here into the woods without the beacon?

I found her, her back turned to me as she was on her knees next to a tree. She was breathing heavy… sobbing? I lowered my weapon as I approached her.

“Ait-aama? What’s wrong? Are you hurt?” I asked, concerned, as I began to reach my hand out to her as she was just a few feet in front of me.

“K’yarneth,” she said, a disturbing growl behind her voice. “You need to leave, get back to the ship. You’re not safe out here.”

“I have the beacon, we’re fine! You need to come with me and explain why you left your fucking teeth in a pile on the ship! You scared me, I thought you got killed and dragged off the ship or something!”

“K’yarneth, please, you need to go. I don’t know what’s happening with…” she paused, lowering her head more and further away from me.

I crouched down behind her and slowly put my hand on her shoulder to try and comfort her, “You don’t know what’s happening with what, Ait?”

“With me, K’yarn,’ she snapped as she turned her head back towards me finally.

I fell back in shock, dropping the Scorpion to the ground as I found myself rapidly crawling backward until my back hit another tree. I was nearly hyperventilating, muscles trembling in the leaves on the ground, and my mouth stuck open in utter terror.

The raspy growl behind her voice made sense now. The teeth - her teeth - she had them still. But they weren’t of a xindrait, they were… terrifying. They were sharp and jagged behind her lips… like the Marjini.

She was turning. Ait was turning.


	8. Skittering Horrors

The fire crackled from the logs in front of me, the little embers coming from it just barely visible to me as it seemed like the only sounds around were coming from the low pops of the flames themselves. I was alone out here, for the time being, sitting on another larger log that Ventrus himself had carried over with his biotic strength so that we wouldn’t have to be cramped in the ship for the rest of the morning that we found ourselves in.

A sigh of defeat came from behind me, the location of our crashed but still somehow functional ship. Ventrus was the one to step out, back in his full armor set to keep him warm since it was rather cold here in the morning for yet another unknown reason.

“She’s doing okay,” he said as he sat beside me on the log, “all things considered.” He took hold of my hand before continuing on, “Her blood isn’t completely blackened yet like the ferals or those soldiers. I think her change is still in the very early stages.”

“Is she…” I trailed off, tightening my hold on his own hand, “Is there any chance she could-”

“I’m still ready to kick Brilxox’s ass if that’s what you’re worried about,” my sister’s voice called out behind me. Her voice still sounded the same, barely any rasp to her voice like the Marjini had… maybe there was still hope we could find a way to fix her before it was too late. The door closed behind her and then she moved over to sit to my left and held tightly onto my free hand.

"You know, most siblings back on Palaven barely even know each other, it's nice to see how close you two are with each other."

"It's just how we're raised. When everyone looks nearly identical you need to know who your family is unless you want a confusing time calling out for people," Ait laughed, reminding me that she is still fine, all things considered.

Ven nuzzled my hand against his forehead before opening his eyes like he remembered something and reached to his side. He pulled out a small pouch loaded with a few odd-looking tubes that I remembered as his flashbangs that he used against the Marjini.

“During my little bit of… spare time last night, I was able to scrap some parts of the ship that weren’t working anymore,” he exclaimed proudly. “And then I tried to see if I could use the parts for our advantage, which lead to me being able to make a few flashbangs with an extra punch.”

“And by ‘extra punch’, you mean what exactly?” I asked him

“That one of these babies could kill a small horde of ferals no problem. We just gotta stay away from it ourselves unless we want a splitting headache. More literally for you guys.”

“Well, at least we know how to throw and run by now,” Ait said with a laugh before clearing her throat. “Just make sure we save one for Brilxox, that bastard deserves it.”

“Killing him should be easy enough, he’s been on our Council longer than anyone and I’m surprised he’s lasted this long without someone else trying to take him out for political reasons.”

“We just have to be careful. If he mutated enough to be able to infect others with his tendrils,” she paused, trailing with her last word before continuing, “he could be a lot different now; dangerous, even.”

“Then we’ll just have even more of a fun time putting him down, won’t we?”

The three of us sat in silence for a little while, listening to the fire as its last embers crackled and signified we needed to start what would likely be the hardest part of our trip so far. Ait offered to connect the ship’s auto-call feature to Ventrus’ OT, basically making it so that we can call the ship to us once we finish what we have to.

“It should help you guys get off this rock as quickly as possible-” she spoke before I cut her off.

“Help us all get off this rock, Ait. And then we’ll head back to Amarium and tell Dad about how much of an adventure he missed.”

She went quiet again, as she finished the connection setup to Ven’s OT. After it was done, we packed up everything we thought we would need, mainly a few types of emergency rations that the ships came stocked with as well as all of our weapons that we came with, we started our trek through the fertile thicket towards the east.

Ait-aama took point, saying that she could see everything surprisingly well around her. To me, the only thing it could mean is that her hearing must’ve been affected by the infection too- which would make sense since the Fer’yasai had advanced hearing themselves and that mutation would have to start early on in the process.

I followed a few feet behind her with Ventrus a few more feet behind me. He had his rifle out and was keeping a lookout on every part of our surroundings, quickly pointing his weapon at every slight sound in the woods like he expected another horde to pop out of the ground even though we had still had the beacon on us for protection. And with its boosted range, nothing should even be in seeing range for the rest of our time on the planet.

“Can you guys hear that ringing?” Ait asked, looking over her shoulder at us briefly.

“I can’t hear anything other than the trees moving- K’yarn?”

“Nothing here either,” I said, stumped. We kept walking until I had a sudden thought pop into my head: the beacon. “Do you think the signal from the beacon could be doing it?”

“It’s possible, plus it would explain why you two can’t hear anything and I’ve had a migraine brewing since last night.”

With that, I reached into my pocket and pulled the beacon out before tossing it back to Ven who caught it and stashed it away under a fold in his armor which was probably a much safer place than my robes had been this whole time.

“Any better for you, Ait?”

“Not in the slightest, but the thought is appreciated.”

After a few hours of nonstop walking, we were all complaining about needing to take a little rest stop. But Ven kept pushing us along, looking at the beacon and talking about how we were so close and then said it again after we walked for another thirty minutes.

But once Ait had enough, saying she was done going on for the moment, Ventrus jogged up past us through the trees. Not wanting to be left alone without the beacon, we had no choice but to run after him and call out for him to stop. The shrubs and tall grass seemed to be growing smaller and thinner around as the more we followed him, revealing more of the soil underneath instead of the grassy surface we’d seen everywhere else on the moon.

We were suddenly stopped by Ventrus’ long arms, holding us back from going farther past him where he stood. I looked around as best I could and realized we must’ve been in another clearing as the trees stopped and the only thing in front of us was… what was that?

“Ven? A little help with the scenery?” I asked him, trying to figure out what we were looking at.

“Yeah, it’s some kind of… sinkhole?” he answered with an equally confused tone to his voice. “The grass just stops and all this grey and white ash is sinking into the hole. It looks a lot like that stuff we saw in the caves, actually.”

I kicked a patch of grass beneath my feet and it landed in the downwards slant toward the hole. The ash absorbed it as it went down, showing how corrupted the land really was under the false exterior.

Ven looked at the beacon and said that the energy reading that drew us here was around somewhere, but not from the actual pit itself. We split up to look around, Ven heading left while Ait-aama and I went right. All we could scout out was more tree coverage that led off to even more expanses of foliage like what we spent hours walking through to get here.

We were about to head back to the sinkhole ourselves when my OT started to ring. Since it had to be made with specialized sound technology - thank you, Aurelius - it had limited functionality compared to the regular tools but it could still make and receive calls and messages which is all I ever really needed it for.

He said we needed to get over to him and look at what he found, but he sounded discouraged on his end, like what he saw was nothing to be hopeful about, only worrying me further. Ait and I walked back to the pit and went around it to head the direction Ventrus did, continuing through shrubs and branches until we spotted him standing on a ledge of some sort.

I approached the ledge beside him, peering down over the side and not being able to make out any sort of seeable bottom. Straight out was no better either, there was absolutely nothing I could see myself, leading to me nudging Ventrus’ arm to nonverbally ask him what he was seeing.

“I can’t see anything either, K’yarn,” he said morosely, kicking a rock over the ledge and letting it fall to the depths below. “It’s just all unnatural fog. Makes me wonder if there even is anything else past it all or if there’s just more wastes.”

“I take it the beacon isn’t giving any help then?”

“Nope, still says that energy reading is nearby, but whatever it is, I can’t seem to find it.”

“Then I guess we just keep walking,” I sighed, stepping back towards Ait who was behind us. “The two of us found more trees the other way, maybe we’ll find something if we just keep walking. This moon can only be so big.”

I started walking with Ait but turned around when I noticed Ventrus wasn’t following us. He was crouched over the ledge, looking down like he was inspecting something.

“Did you guys hear that? I could’ve sworn I heard-” he spoke, cut off by some sort of tendril latching onto his arm.

“Ventrus!” I yelled, leaving Ait as I tried to run toward Ventrus to keep whatever that thing was from pulling him over the edge.

But just before I could reach him, he was dragged over the side, a muffled scream quickly growing quieter and more distant. And once I reached the edge, several more tendrils reached up from the side, slithering along the ground like they were searching for something else to grab. I stumbled backward and nearly fell before Ait caught me and helped me rebalance on the rocky ground.

A ferocious growl came from the ledge, followed by two thin, skeletal hands clawing up the side with pointed and elongated fingers. Then a second set of hands came up, and a third, until finally the six-armed beast pulled itself up and was revealed. This Fer’yasai was like nothing I’d seen in my 1,800 years of life.

This thing wasn’t animalistic in appearance, quite the opposite, in fact. It had an eerily anthropoid figure and height, extremely similar to a normal xindrait. But instead of arms separating at the shoulder, it had three on each side of its torso, along with several extremely long and writhing tentacles from its head that had dangerous, serrated points to them. Its legs were digitigrade, extremely animal-like, and it had no discernible face on its shoulders, only a solid bony plating that looked like a helmet. Most of its body was equally bone covered, making it look nearly untouchable by anything we had on us for weaponry.

As quickly as the thing spotted us, the bottom of its head plating opened up and revealed a horrifying mouth full of razor-sharp teeth, inches longer than what Ait had started developing last night. A terrible roar erupted from it, loud enough to put Ait on her knees with her overly-sensitive hearing. Then the thing contorted onto its arms and legs like a spider, all for tentacles going stiff and pointing at the two of us.

I took out my pistol and laid a shot right in the thing’s face, sending it reeling back. The collision of the gel grenade against its plating caused a screen of smoke to temporarily cover it. But then it crawled out from the fog, its face completely undamaged by the shot that had managed to kill everything else so far with a single round. That could explain why the thing wasn’t repelled by the beacon either; the sound waves couldn’t penetrate the plating either.

In a rash moment of wanting to try anything, I pointed the gun at one of the thing’s arms, landing it again and actually damaging the unprotected bit of flesh which sent it stepping back in pain. I went to fire again but the pistol clicked instead. The thing was out of ammo and I needed to try and reload it, but the creature was already focused on me once again and resumed its charge towards me.

Ait stood beside me, gripping onto my arm as I fumbled in my robe pouch for the extra thermal clip that I had packed with me on the trip. I tried to step in front of her but she pushed me back, holding her hand out as if she was trying to gesture for the monster to stop. But much to my surprise, once the thing ran into her hand, it stopped dead in its tracks.

The body of the thing stood completely still as if it were frozen in time. So did Ait, almost like they were stuck that way together for reasons I couldn’t even begin to comprehend. I was absolutely dumbfounded, standing behind her in shock and slowly reaching out to touch her shoulder as if it could somehow free her of her situation. Before I could even touch her, the creature dropped to the ground with her, the thing growling while she grunted on her knees, now putting both hands onto the thing’s head.

I swallowed the fear I was feeling and managed to finally pull out the thermal clip and eject the old one, loading the fresh canister into my pistol just as it seemed that the plating of the creature’s head was beginning to part all over. Everything underneath was extremely fleshy and looked especially vulnerable. Was Ait somehow making this happen?

I didn’t want to spend too long figuring out possibilities in my head, instead jamming the muzzle of the gun into one of the openings that presented itself, then pulled the trigger and the bony plating contained the explosion inside its head, leading to a disgusting, wet sound as the remnants of its head contents sizzled and oozed through the cracks.

Ait nearly fell back as she released her hands from the thing, leading to me having to hold onto her and help her back to her feet as she did for me earlier. She was exhausted, panting like she had just finished running a mile and leaning over with her hands on her knees. I was about to ask what she did- how she did it. But then my own OT started beeping as a call came in, making me jump in surprise as I rushed to try and pick it up.

“Ventrus? Ven?” I caught myself screaming into the receiver on my forearm, getting nothing back but muffled static. As bad as the situation was… at least he was okay enough to be calling me. That fall would’ve killed him, so if he survived at all then he must’ve somehow used his biotics to save himself. I had to hope. “We’ll find you soon, Kishantey. I don’t know how but- just wait, I promise.”

A few more seconds of static and eventually the transmission cut out on his end, leaving us in silence again. That was another thing that made me dislike this planet besides the carnivorous beasts that crawled around: the silence. There was no wind, no breeze, no feeling of warmth coming from the sun, nothing. The only sounds were of the monsters in the distance and the leaves and grass that crunched under our feet when we walked. And now that we were without the beacon, nothing was as clearly constantly visible as before since the constant tone of the thing wasn’t close enough to give us the powerful sight boost.

“K’yarneth, that thing,” Ait mumbled, finally getting back in a normal standing position, “it wasn’t a normal Fer’yasai.”

“Yeah, I kinda got that when you had to do your little mind-melding so I could shoot it- what was that, by the way? Not gonna lie, it’s cool but since when could you do… that?”

“I could hear it, in a way. It had a voice that wasn’t like anything I’ve heard before. I couldn’t understand the dialect but the meaning, K’yarneth, it was all there!” she exclaimed as she circled the creature’s body.

“Care to explain that so that it actually makes sense?”

“This thing itself couldn’t speak, it was purely a beast. An advanced one for sure, but still a beast. I think- I think that there was something else speaking through it. Or to it? I’m still not entirely sure but it’s… incredible.”

“What? Do you think Brilxox is controlling all of these things somehow?”

“No, it wasn’t his voice either. There’s something else on this planet, K’yarn. Something much more intelligent than he is.”

I didn’t know how much I trusted in this new revelation. I hated to think about it, but I was starting to think that maybe her mind was starting to slip with the infection. But the sureness of her voice, the confidence radiating from her, it was starting to convince me as well, even if only slightly at this point.

“Ait, if that’s true… then what do we even do next? That would mean Brilxox is only some kind of pawn.”

“Yes, and that killing him wouldn’t even help at this point. It seems like there’s only one thing to do about it, K’yarn.”

I sighed in disbelief, knowing exactly what she meant. We came to kill Brilxox and stop the invasion. But if he wasn’t the mastermind, then we had a new, faceless target somewhere on this moon that was likely an even tougher one to take out, whatever or whoever it was.

A sudden shuffling in the treeline startled both of us, leading to the two of us pointing our pistols toward the sound as it moved around in front of us. The cause was unseeable so far, but I knew we were vulnerable now without the beacon to ward any Fer’yasai off. We were on our own now, and I wasn’t sure we could handle too much more since it took both of us to kill that one creature just now.

We continued to back away from the trees until we had to walk around the edge of the sinkhole to avoid falling in. Then the creator of the noises revealed itself: another one of those six-armed beasts, this one crawling right onto the body of the dead one. It leaned down, almost like it was smalling its fallen partner, then roared at us. In a truly horrifying display, it pushed its own body into the corpse and their two bodies quickly started to seemingly morph into one.

Their skin blended as well as their bone formations until even the limbs of the dead Fer’yasai began to twitch with life. We knew well enough that staying here was only gonna get us killed; we needed to move as fast as possible. We broke out into a run and left that thing behind us, a combination of roars letting us know whatever melding they were doing was almost finished.

We kept running and running, the sounds of trees cracking and breaking nearby meaning the thing was chasing us, and getting extremely close by the second. Eventually, the trees broke into another rocky ledge surrounded by an open, foggy expanse. I stopped Ait-aama from nearly falling off the edge herself, both of us gasping as we clung to each other in fear.

I heard the beast still heading for us, but now I could hear more sounds coming a little distance away from the right: more regular Fer’yasai that must’ve been alerted to our presence either by our appearance or by the loud sounds of that fusion chasing us.

Looking down, the ledge has a much less severe cliff face than the last. Instead of a sheer drop, there was a narrow patch of rock that came to a slope, though I couldn’t tell quite how far it went like that because of the fog. All I knew was that we had mere seconds before we were trapped, and there was no way both of us could make it down the slope in time.

Ait grabbed a hold of the sides of my face and before she even spoke, I knew what she was about to suggest.

“I’m not doing it, Ait,” I told her, grabbing onto her wrists in defiance.

“K’yarneth, you have to. I at least have a chance going against that thing. You need to go find Ventrus and stop whatever’s causing all this.”

“I can’t, Ait, I-” words were starting to leave my mind. I couldn’t think, pure instinct was trying to kick in but I couldn’t bring myself to leave her like this willingly. “I can’t lose you, Ait.”

“You won’t lose me,” she said, pressing our headplates together. “I’ll find you two again soon enough, just make sure that if it takes me a while… put a round in Brilxox’s head for me anyway.”

The two of us laughed in an attempt to hide our own despair but were cut off with a loud, incredibly close growl from the fusion monster. Ait let go of me and I hesitantly loosened my grip on her wrists, our hands holding onto each other for another brief second before she turned towards the trees in preparation.

“Hoshyta kukoni, K’yarneth.”

I sat along the ledge and positioned myself to slide down the slope, hoping that it would lead somewhere other than another pool of ash and Fer’yasai, “Hoshyta kukoni, Ait-aama. Dad’s gonna love hearing you tell him about this.”

“His son running in terror while his daughter single-handedly fought off a horde of Fer’yasai? Oh, I’m holding this against for the rest of my life.”

With that, I gulped and pushed myself down the slope. It was easy enough to maneuver down the rocky terrain and I was in the foggy mist before I knew it. I could hear another roar from the fusion and then silence, leaving me with nothing but the sound of my own legs sliding down the rocks as the fog stopped me from seeing anything a few feet in front of me. All I could do was hope that this brought me somewhere that led me to Ventrus… and that we could save Ait before we left Oja once and for all.


	9. Turian Perspective

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just a small note for right here: Chapters 9 through 11 are all in Ventrus' POV
> 
> Chapter 12 and on returns to K'yarneth, I just wanted to test having a different view to see how it'd fit! :)

The sound of the air rushed past my head as I fell into the unknown depths. The fog made it impossible to see what was in front of me. Spirits, I couldn’t even see how deep this drop went and no amount of turian plating was gonna save me from a drop that’s lasted this long already. I figured about twelve seconds meant maximum velocity and it had to have been at least eight by now- much longer than it seems when you’re the one doing the actual falling.

Trying to focus my biotic power was difficult in a situation like this but thirty years of practice made it doable, just in time to slow me down before I hit a rocky wall and rapidly rolled down the rest of the way, stopping just by the edge of what sounded like streaming water.

I couldn’t feel pain, just stress exhaustion that made me hesitate to open my eyes, expecting the harsh fog in my face still. But when I looked, all the fog around me was gone, instead stuck in a flat block several dozen feet above me. Most of this moon’s environment was unnatural but a formed block of pure white fog had to be up there with the oddest so far. And the other side of the canyon was relatively close, this stretch of rocky terrain having to be no wider than twenty feet. And if I couldn’t even see that far in front of me earlier… damn, what in the hell made this place such a death trap? 

The sound of the water flowing by helped me recenter myself and finally sit up. Standing after that was easy enough so at least I knew I hadn’t broken anything… nothing important anyway. I took a few seconds to check my armor to make sure there weren’t any missing pieces, then used my Omni-Tool’s camera to make sure my face wasn’t busted up or anything like that.

The soft sound of gunshots in the distance made my eyes widen with suspense and fear for what was happening beyond my sight. I couldn’t climb back up, I had to have fallen over a thousand feet, and my biotics would only carry me so far before I exhausted myself again. There had to be a way out of here, and maybe that water could lead me to it. Turian Bootcamp taught us basic survival, and following water tends to lead to places you want to go.

But my first priority was K’yarneth and Ait, of course. I didn’t take too long to use my OT to try and call them but all I was getting on my end was unintelligible static. I couldn’t even tell if he was speaking, but I had to hope he could hear me as I promised to find him soon, no matter where he was, before hanging up.

I needed a minute or two to gather my thoughts. Stressing out wouldn’t help me get out of here and definitely wouldn’t help me get back to K’yarn. I needed to follow this stream… wherever it would take me. It was running to the west where we just came from, meaning that further east had higher ground and by that logic, closer to K’yarneth and Ait-aama.

I scanned the water with my OT to make sure it actually was water, but there was something that couldn’t be identified in the mix. Under the surface was something else. Not dangerous, but bending down and running my hand through it revealed it was black with the consistency of a more runny slime. The goop reminded me of feral blood, but like it had begun to take a new form under the water instead of a body. Maybe it’s another type of mutation? Everything on this moon seems to have adapted in one way or another, maybe even the liquid had to adapt itself to flourish.

Thinking about the ferals made me remember the beacon that I still had tucked in my armor. I pulled it out and, besides a crack across the small screen, it was working just fine and sending out the repellant signal. And with any hope, it would keep me safe long enough to find the other two and save them before they needed the signal themselves.

Another energy source was getting picked up nearby, likely something else living like the thing that threw me down here in the first place. Hopefully, it was less sneaky so I could actually fight it instead of getting my ankle taken out from under me. Whatever it was, it was coming from up the stream so I’m bound to hit it if I just keep walking like I wanted to anyway.

The river ran for a long while, the fog above staying thick in a large cloud above me. The water ran slowly like mountain runoff instead of fast like it was from a large body of water, but the black slime underneath the surface ran the entire way. It made me think: Is it only like this under the water? Or does the entire planet have this stuff under the crusts?

After a good while of walking, the beacon started to beep again- the last time that happened meant that thing was tossing me around. And sure enough, a small spurt came from the shallow water beside me, bubbles erupting either from the water or the black slime beneath it. The first to pop out was a mass of tentacles, each one pointed and most definitely great for piercing turian armor. Then it revealed the rest of itself: a torso with a mass of arms keeping it up instead of legs. I had to hand it to the thing, it was absolutely terrifying.

It was coated in the black goop of the stream and it left me wondering if the thing chose to come up from there or if it was somehow just created by it. I was leaning towards the latter as the thing seemed to not know how to use its own body yet, more or less stumbling around as it tried to find me. The signal must not have been able to get past its head plating but it still looked easy enough to take out as a roadblock.

I whistled at it, drawing its attention which caused it to lower itself to the ground and hiss like one of those feral cats they used to have in the streets on Earth. Its head split open vertically to reveal a long, tongue-like appendage and a throat full of teeth. It charged me clumsily, tripping over its own arms like a toddler despite being twice the size of me. I didn’t bother even pulling out my rifle, I just focused my biotic power to my fist and clocked it across the head.

The force of the hit was enough to quite literally knock half of its head off, the split it originally did likely being the only thing that saved it from dying outright. But now it was writhing on the ground, completely defenseless as its tendrils shrunk up to try and protect it.

I charged another wave of aura into my fist and struck it down into the other half of the thing’s head, this hit making it stop moving for good besides the last few nerve twitches. I rinsed my hand off with the water nearby to make sure it couldn’t even have a chance to cause problems later, whatever they might be.

Not wanting to chance any possible healing or anything of the sort, I dragged the body away from the water and left it closer to the canyon wall. After making sure nothing else was popping out at me for the moment, I continued to go up the stream’s path for another short while until I made it to my first landmark: a wall.

Again, I couldn’t see upwards past the fog but I could remember my view from atop the canyon and there was no way this wall was low enough to try and scale, plus it was essentially flat and I didn’t feel like trying to save myself from another near-deadly fall.

There was a large crack along the wall that was just large enough for me to squeeze through and into a narrow passage that I had to crawl through. The natural light from the outside barely illuminated the passage but I was able to see a faint, blue light a little way into the distance. I scooted to it slowly until I was able to stand up, now in the main part of this cavern. The first thing I did was pull out my Phaeston rifle and switch on the flashlight so I wasn’t left completely in the dim light.

To my amazement, the cave was covered in small, blue lights. I shined my flashlight over them and realized they were something like small mushrooms. They covered the ceiling and every wall of the place and made me feel surprisingly calm compared to the rest of the moon so far. It almost reminded me of the caves on Palaven where me and my boot camp friends used to go and relax in the natural springs.

I could hear a few distinct sounds: water dripping from the ceiling stalagmites, the stream coming from somewhere deeper in the cave, and slight wind from what I could only assume was the exit out of here up ahead. It looked like the stream of water continued straight ahead through some winding parts of the cavern, but I eventually came across a convergence of all the paths that lead down to another longer tunnel, only this one was devoid of the blue mushrooms and had only a stray beam of what looked to be natural sunlight barely illuminating a room at the end.

I had to step over a few stalagmites to enter, but after that was a relatively straightforward passage to walk through. I thought I heard rocks move, making me quickly turn my flashlight around to see what it was. But nothing was there, just a few pebbles that were slightly shaking like something had just run over them. I could feel my heart suddenly racing in my chest at the thought of something being in here with me in a space where I was relatively cornered.

Another sound from the original direction I was heading made me turn again, this time with the added surprise of something leaping at my face. Luckily, my reflexes were fast enough to catch it before it came into contact with my actual face, but it had tendrils that wrapped around the back of my head and left the skin it touched just slightly numb; if this thing was trying to paralyze me… I wasn’t gonna let it happen.

But then another odd side effect started. It was like my own memories were being played in my head and I couldn’t control them

Between hallucinations, I could feel one of the tendrils around the tip of my fringe and it gave me an idea. The walls were close so I just banged the back of my head against the rock and it was more than enough force for the point of my fringe plating to pierce the little creature’s flesh, sending it scurrying back away from me in retreat.

By the time I tried to point my flashlight at it to actually see it and fill it with holes, the thing was already gone. A quick search around showed that it seemed to have almost disappeared entirely, but how could the thing move that quickly? From what I had seen of it, it was almost crablike and covered with bony plating. Maybe it was gone for good, but in the case that it wasn’t, I let my biotic aura flare so I could repel it at a moment’s notice.

Slowly, I continued down the pathway until I reached a large clearing with an unexpected sight. It was almost completely circular and devoid of anything in it except for a small, mossy boulder in the middle of it, being illuminated by a beam of light coming in from the ceiling. It looked like there was a single flower growing from the middle of it but my eyes couldn’t quite focus on it. What I could see was that the stream seemed to go perfectly around the rock like a moat, almost as if I was supposed to find this somehow.

I rubbed my eyes and got closer to the thing until its form was apparent. It was a black, zinnia-like flower; a Ventreth flower, like back on Pas-10 in Andromeda. But there definitely wasn’t any lava or volcanic ash around to give it a habitat, and the possibility of there being Remnant activity in this galaxy too was something I didn’t even want to think about. This flower had no reason to be here, just like the rest of the moon’s life, but here it was.

I went to pick the flower, feeling like the petals were quite literally calling me to touch them. But then a raging headache suddenly took hold of me, forcing me to hold my temples and groan as it felt like someone just took a sledgehammer to my head. I had to put my gun down against the rock and take a break to sit against the wall and close my eyes, the feeling starting to subside after a couple of seconds.

After blinking a lot more and trying to get my vision back now that it was almost entirely blurred for some reason. Maybe it was something to do with the mushrooms? The flower? Spirits, maybe that little gremlin did more to me than I thought it did after the brief contact. But my thought process was interrupted by the sound of soft footsteps echoing against the walls. Looking up, everything was still out of focus except for one figure: K’yarneth.

He was standing there completely still, staring at me. I called out to him weakly, my ears still ringing, but he remained unmoving. I stood back up slowly while keeping my eyes on him, unsure if it was really coincidentally him or just another illusion that was being caused by whatever that thing hit me with.

I approached him slowly, continuing to call his name as I studied him for any sort of reaction. But that was when I noticed his clothing. It was just more robing, but it was an old outfit he hadn’t worn since before he was officially named an Ambassador on the Nexus. He really was just another illusion. After reaching my own conclusion and about ready to just get out of here to recover somewhere without beacon-resistant ferals.

But as soon as I reached for my gun near the boulder, the illusion of K’yarneth growled in my direction. His lips parted to reveal needle-like teeth that glittered in the dim light as a spontaneous strand of saliva fell from his mouth. Then a large crack split vertically down his faceplate and lips, then all of it splitting open entirely to reveal nothing but blackened flesh and rows of asymmetrical teeth.

Several tendrils slithered from its split open throat as the rest of its body reverted into a more feral shape that showed even the robing was fake. I grabbed my gun quickly as it started to rush me full speed on all fours like a canine. I was able to aim and shoot it down the throat a few times before it pounced and tackled me to the ground which I would think an actual illusion couldn’t do. But whatever this thing was, it wasn’t K’yarneth and wasn’t getting any mercy from me.

A quick biotic blast threw it off of me, sending its body hard into the ceiling and allowing me enough time to roll out of its impact on the ground. As I pointed my gun at it again, the creature changed forms and it left me frozen in a mixture of fear and stunned amazement.

Its hands devolved fully into elongated claws, followed by its legs fusing into a long, slithering tail. Unluckily for the feral, its show of shapeshifting power was nothing more than a little delay since its wide-open head was an easy target to unload a few dozen rifle shots into that left it leaking an absurd amount of black blood as it slowly lowered to the ground and died with a final, drifting growl.

The last remnants of the headache were finally starting to fade away enough that the environment was coming into focus just as my heart was starting to slow down now that I thought the immediate danger was dealt with for good.

I used the boulder that my back was against to help myself stand back up, not wanting to take my eyes off the beast in case it was still alive. But now that I could actually see what was around me without that thing’s chemical agents fucking with my head, a few parts of the room were different than I had originally thought they were.

The boulder didn’t have a flower on it anymore, now just another blue mushroom that sat in its place. And the longer I stared at the feral, the more its form continued to change until I was able to see that it was actually the thing that tried to attach to my face earlier. It had a long, thin tail and a small body no bigger than a fist, but it must have been able to either shapeshift itself into a bigger form or the illusion was just that powerful.

With the moment of reprieve to catch my breath, I put my rifle back onto its holster on my back and took the time to scan the creature with my OT. As expected, most of it was unknown genetic material, but it was able to read a hallucinogen chemical that filled its tendrils which must’ve been what it put into my skin. The chemical was extremely close to lysergic acid diethylamide- the drug LSD. It must’ve gotten me through my skin like I had already thought, but I find it odd how specific this thing was to affect bare skin when most any prey it could possibly attack would have bony plating all over it.

But then I remembered: LSD was a drug that only affected humans with hallucinations because of their levo-protein amino acids similar to the xindraits and the rest of the ferals. Turians had dextro-proteins, which is exactly what this version of the drug was altered to affect. I had to try and collect my thoughts for a moment, backing away to sit on the mossy rock once more.

This moon’s life evolved centuries ago to be able to thrive here. Normal people turned into monsters and the environment was changed to somehow support life there. But maybe they were more capable of adaptation than I could’ve even thought, some sort of hyper-advanced evolution. Nothing on Oja had a biological reason for extra head plating, but once we bring a beacon to repel them with sound, we get attacked by new creatures that have plating made specifically to make them immune to the beacon.

That coincidence aside, even this trip I had made at the bottom of the canyon seemed too perfect to be coincidental. I mean, this stream led me here and a feral happened to come out from the black goop to try and kill me? And then I finally get to this cave and get attacked by another creature that’s somehow perfectly suited to be able to hurt only me? I think there was something else here, something else much more advanced that was helping this speedy evolution go on.

Whatever was going on, I know that me, K’yarn, and Ait were enough to stop it… we had to be. I just needed to keep on pushing through and find them and we could save Amarium once and for all. So I kept moving through the tunnels like I originally planned on, finding more long, winding tunnels until there was a dead end of some sort. It wasn’t more rock like the cave, this seemed like it had been a threshold a long time ago but was sealed off, evident by the lines along the frame of the doorway not being connected to the blockade.

Admittedly haphazardly, I punched into the blockage with a biotic fist, easily shattering it to pieces and spontaneously filling the air with the most horrible scent I’d ever smelled in my life, enough to send me reeling back and coughing and wishing more than ever I would’ve snagged my helmet from the Nexus before we ever came here.

Hesitantly, I stepped into the next room and did my best to breathe through my mouth. The room was nearly pitch black, another stone slab opposite of me in the room, likely my way out of here once I was done exploring. But this smell was horrifyingly familiar: death.

A quick shine of the flashlight around the room revealed what was causing the smell: a hefty number of withered corpses of extremely humanoid forms, definitely not ferals. If I had to take a guess by the amount of dust, the appearance, and the smell, these might have actually been xindraits that didn’t devolve into ferals like the rest.

They were all very dead and obviously weren’t gonna be much use to me… though if we survive, I’ll go ahead and add this place to my OT map so any historians can come here and check it out for some old culture. Though most of the room was empty and the barricades meant these poor souls were probably hiding out to try and stay safe. Had they managed to somehow survive long enough to not need to mutate? Or were they locked in here and died before the mutations even started?

Much to my surprise, these xindraits wore tattered remains of something other than the usual robing. It pained my nostrils to do so, but a closer inspection showed that it was thickly lined with protective fabric that wouldn’t be necessary for the lush jungle. Plus they all seemed to have helmets that were less for protection and instead had some sort of respirator at the front with old, eroded hoses that would have attached to packs they had on their backs.

I counted nine xindraits total in the room, my OT scans showing they died from malnutrition; they starved to death, trapped here for who knows how long. But there were still many more little bits of information to gather here. One of them was clutching a bag in its arms which I wanted to search through, a gentle tug of the strap being enough to make the husks of its arms crumble into dust.

I sat on my knees to rummage through the pockets of the pack, though most of it was meant solely for xindraits so I had to use my OT again to decrypt it with the helpful mods that K’yarneth had given the Initiative so we could actually read his reports.

It took a few minutes for every file to be readable, half of the tablets were either destroyed or inactive after so many years of neglect. But one tablet still had some juice in it, just enough for me to transfer the files before it shorted out. But since everything was on my OT now, I could actually read through it all.

Most of the files were useless; reports of the jungle which meant that these people didn’t live here or else they would’ve been feral by the time the jungle started to grow in. These xindraits were explorers. A deeper dive into the files revealed much more trivial information, such as the initials of the crew members. The problem was that nine people were in this room, yet the files marked ten people on the team. In fact, their assignment and initials were highlighted: Recon Leader B.S.

Then, at the very end of the list, was an audio file. The coding showed it was mostly intact; I could actually listen to one of the last reports these people recorded. It took a little work to get playing, but eventually, the clip started to play and the sound echoed around the walls.

“Renata Shin’koh, Lead Science Expert. Year 2000 CE. This is my personal log while we’re stuck here in this room because of that bastard,” it started, a feminine voice filled with absolute fury doing the talking, apparently over 700 years ago. “The rest of the crew is trapped with me, we even had to barricade ourselves because these damn creatures kept finding us somehow. We can’t get a signal back to Amarium because our leader took the transmitter before leaving us for dead.”

A bout of static interrupted the message, only the occasional word getting through until it broke back in, “He’s not in control, we’ve all been hearing the voice but he was the first that it broke. The creatures here aren’t independent, they all listen to something else. We only saw a part of it from the mountains but it’s… massive beyond comprehension. Whatever it is, it has the rest of the monsters here under its thumb, and now that it has one of our own under its control, I fear for our home planet.” She went quiet on her end, the faint sounds of what was likely the rest of her crew talking to each other in the background filling the silence. “Amarium, if you get ever receive this log,” she said, a deep sigh taking over before she spoke,

“Do not trust Brilxox Scuziek, the thing has him now.”


	10. Apocalypse

I was still rummaging through the bags and clothing pockets of these old corpses, and still finding more and more documentation of what went on here all those years ago. Aside from everyone collectively agreeing Brilxox was under the control of something, I also learned that they frequently referred to it as the “All-Seer”, or at least they say that’s what Brilxox called it.

Searching through old dead people wasn’t exactly a hobby of mine, but I felt like killing Brilxox wouldn’t end all of our problems. There had to be something else--something bigger--going on that we still couldn’t even fully comprehend. But these tablets gave nothing more than cryptic information, even more was either gibberish that they tried to write as they died or something the Omni-Tool couldn’t even decipher since it was a centuries-old version of the xindrait language.

Still, if this “All-Seer” is some sort of creature or another person, then they need to be dealt with. It’s also possible Brilxox could’ve been calling himself the All-Seer… I hated mysteries, solving them was more up Aurelius’ alley than mine. But I remembered some of the tactics he told me about from his Blackwatch days which were easily summed up to “save the information and hope it’s useful later.” If I’m lucky, then either K’yarneth or Ait-aama will be able to translate once I see them again.

Now that I’d done essentially all that I possibly could, I needed to get back on the move. The rock covering the other exit had light filtering through which meant there was either an escape route or some sort of artificial light, either way sounding questionable between better or worse. I tried to take a wide stance and push it along, but xindraits have more muscle than turians and I feel like it took multiple members of the team to even move this stone slab themselves.

I focused my biotic power into my arms just enough to give me a convenient bit of strength aid, more than enough for me to pull the stone back and move out of the way just in time for it to fall back and hit the ground with a loud thud that kicked up dust from the cave floor. I hurried out of the room to try and avoid breathing any of it in, though I’m sure I’d already inhaled more than enough to do damage if it was actually dangerous just from walking around the planet.

The opening led into a semi-long and straightforward cavern hall. The stream of black goop must have a source nearby since this hall formed a ramp, the goop dripping down from the top like runoff that collected here at the base of it. The light I saw was definitely sunlight, shining brightly through some sort of obstruction at the end of the hall that I couldn’t see because of the glare. Though I could very easily see how disgusting the walls leading to it were; they were covered in the grey matter that polluted the caves on Amarium.

As if that wasn’t disgusting enough, a film of that black sludge ran down the floor between here and there, meaning every footstep I took sounded like I was stepping on baked noodles and left me pulling my legs up like I was stuck on fresh tar. The spirits couldn’t even begin to understand how badly I just wanted to torch this whole moon and call it a day.

After a few dozen feet, the surface transitioned to the grey matter. It was much more solid ground and seemed to absorb the sludge from my boots somehow. Out of a suddenly irrational but not improbable fear that this floor could open up and eat me or something along those lines, I quickened my steps uphill.

The masses crunched beneath me like they were hollow shells. I don’t think these masses were growths anymore- more like the absence of life. Like the rock of the planet itself was devoid of any nutrients. But that begged the question: why is there grass and trees in several parts of Oja then? Have they not been drained yet? Or are they just a fake way of making everything look nice for unsuspecting visitors like it did for Brilxox’s team? Either way, it all needed to go down sooner rather than later.

Toward the end of the hall, it was nearly steep enough to start moving on all fours but I didn’t want to start getting my hands stuck anywhere on this planet. But I eventually crawled out of it all, pushing past a thin sheet of the grey material which crumbled into dust at my touch. The sudden amount of sunshine was a small shock to my eyes, making me turn my head away and squint as my pupils readjusted to the outside world instead of a dank cave.

Once my eyes were able to handle the light, I almost wished that I couldn’t see at all. Everything was covered in that grey substance, nothing left but a tall hill to my right and completely flat and dead land everywhere else for as far as my eyes could see. The only break in the view was the occasional dead husk of a tree, blackened and jagged from probable years with nothing to sustain them. But the worst part by far was what was just a few dozen feet in front of me: a large lake full of the black sludge. And when I say large, I mean large enough that I could barely see the land on the other side of it through the moon’s natural curve. I could only assume it was equally deep if not more so, making me wonder what could possibly be the cause of the pit.

As a precautionary measure, I pulled the beacon from its spot under my chest plate to make sure it was still functioning properly, which it was. There was an incredibly small, faint reading coming from the lake, but my guess was that it was just because of the lake being so fully concentrated with the black sludge that had a charge itself. Nevertheless, I walked to the right but kept my distance from the sludge to make sure anything that could’ve possibly been inside wouldn’t grab me like that fucker on top of the canyon.

I slipped the beacon back into my armor plating and checked my Omni-Tool for any possible updates that I could've gotten. Now that I was back onto land and a higher altitude with most of the entire cave system being at an uphill incline, my reception was significantly better and I thought I could try and call K’yarneth again. A few rings and still no answer… it had me worried for him. The only reason he wouldn’t answer would be if he was- No, you aren’t allowed to think like that, Ventrus.

Continuing with my walk around the lake, I noticed the time that had passed: an astounding near-two hours. I know I took my time in the caves with research and all but… maybe that little parasite messed with me more than I thought and left me going in slow motion? Spirits, what if I somehow missed my chance to meet up with K’yarn and Ait and now we were all staying separated until something picked us all off?

A ping from my OT caught my attention. It wasn’t a call, just an alert nearby- my tracker! Last year, K’yarneth wanted to go on a mission with the Pathfinder and me but he ended up getting lost in the jungle environment and couldn’t get himself out so we had to comb the area until we got him safely. So to avoid the situation again, he and I put trackers on each other’s OTs so we couldn’t get lost. But if it was pinging me now, then he had to be extremely close to me. I checked the map screen for a radar scan and there was his blip, coming off even further to the right which meant he could be just over the top of the intimidating hill I’d been trekking beside for safety.

Without hesitation, I got on all fours to rush up the steep hill, making it to the top easily thanks to good ole’ turian endurance training that had yet to fail me when I needed it. I could see something off in the distance, something running. The land up here was flat and wide, the next visible landmark being a steep cliff edge a few hundred feet from here that rose up into the sky. I drug myself to my feet and tried to focus on the figure but there was no mistaking it now; the lightly tattered robing, the way they ran like it definitely wasn’t part of their daily schedule, it had to be K’yarneth… but he wasn’t alone.

One of the ferals was following close behind him and gaining ground quickly. I could tell even from here that it was nearly identical to the type of creature that attacked from the black slime before I made it into the cave system, but with less armor covering its head. That made me remember my idea of these creatures being tailored specifically to attack us, which would make sense since K’yarneth doesn’t have a beacon and therefore creatures wouldn’t need the sound protection. But as interesting as the science was, it was more important to actually save K’yarneth instead of standing here and thinking of some research paper topic in my head.

“K’yarneth!” I yelled out as I started running toward him, pulling my rifle out in the process.

“Ventrus?” he called back confused, followed by a much more excited, “Ventrus!”

It must’ve been hard for him to see me from this distance, even if we were closing in on each other somewhat. But he’d always been able to tell my voice apart from anything else; he said I chirped when I talked to him which I never heard but at least it made a distant reunion a lot easier to handle.

Running made aiming difficult which meant I was gonna have to get real close before unloading a clip into the feral’s face. But I didn’t have to worry about it for too long, as it actually ran right into the range of the beacon, making it go stiff with sensation before it shrieked in pain.

“Get down!” I yelled out as I stopped and took aim through my rifle scope, K’yarn obeying and coming to a stop with a ridiculously smooth slide across the ground until he was on his back.

The rifle had two firing modes: fully automatic, which meant it kept shooting as long as I held the trigger, and chargeable semi-automatic, which was a mod Aurelius did for me that allowed me to charge a shot with enough power to mimic a sniper’s high caliber ammunition at the cost of using the same amount of charge from a thermal clip as a good amount of automatic fire.

I switched the rifle into the single-shot mode and aimed for the beast. Without the bony covering, I didn’t need much power behind it, charging it with only about three of four shots-worth of power before letting go and hitting the creature through the dome, ending it on the spot as it slid face-first across the ground until it stopped right beside K’yarn himself.

K’yarn turned his head at the feral as if he was checking to make sure it stayed still and dead. Then he scurried back to his feet towards me. I placed the rifle on my back since there was nothing else to shoot apart in the immediate area, then ran towards him with just as much enthusiasm.

I was used to him being the one to dominate hugs, I think the last time we had been separated on a mission he literally picked me and spun me enough that I had to sit down for a few minutes. But now he just melted into my arms, making him somewhat hard to handle considering he was a foot taller than me. I think he could sense my struggle--or he heard my enervated groan of exhaustion--because he shrunk himself down just enough to be my height, something he did a lot when we were together because he “didn’t like intimidating me.”

“Ventrus…” he panted out, still trying to catch his breath, “I’ve been running for hours. Those things started tracking me down until that one right there followed me. I came down here looking for you and-”

He looked at me quietly before bumping his head plate against my brow, pushing his lips into mine that came out of seemingly nowhere, not that I was complaining. Turians weren’t the best at kissing like these species with more pliable lips were, but it never stopped K’yarn from trying his damndest to pull me into one whenever he had the chance. He started to run his hands over the flesh of my neck as my eyes closed, me using my grip on his waist to hold him as my legs suddenly felt weak in the moment of wanting to lean into him.

His lips came off mine first, him continuing to pant almost as loudly as my sudden purring was rumbling. But then I noticed how reserved he was, how defeated he sounded even though he was obviously beyond happy to see me again.

“K’yarneth,” I said in a soft tone, starting to fear what answer I could get for what I wanted to ask him, “where’s… where’s Ait-aama?”

He froze in place, even his hold on me loosened up as he glanced back toward the mountains where I assume he came from, “She made me leave her so I could find you.”

“Is she…”

“I don’t know, Ventrus,” he mumbled, his voice starting to sound shaky. “She could do something to the Fer’yasai though- almost like temporarily taming them. I don’t know how it works, but she can actually pacify the ones she touches!”

“So she can control them now?”

“No, more like… I don’t know, actually. She managed to make one stay still long enough for me to kill it- the same one that threw you off the cliff, actually.”

“Damn, I wanted to kill it myself. But does that mean she can actually survive out here?”

“When… I left her, we were getting chased by a creature that fused with the dead one to make itself bigger. I slid down a less steep part of the canyon to escape, but I don’t know if she had the power to tame something that big. Or she could have made friends with it and could be riding it around the mountaintops right now, I have no idea.”

“We’ll find her, too, K’yarneth. I promise.”

He let out a small chuckle as he ran his hand across the front of my armor, “It’s funny, I actually believe it when you say it.”

The two of us held onto each other for a moment longer before we both heard a strange noise nearby. It sounded wet like something was churning nearby. My first thought was of the lake behind us just behind the hill. Thanks to the slime pool’s massive size, I could still easily see it from here and something was very obviously wrong.

The goop that had been entirely still just a moment earlier was now bubbling and rolling with small, thick waves. Then another sound came, this one even closer. A small puddle of the black slime began to bubble up at our feet, causing me to pull K’yarn and myself away from it without hesitation. We continued to slowly back up as I grabbed onto K’yarn’s hand, him squeezing mine back tightly.

Once the puddle had stopped growing, it was just a few feet wide in an imperfect circle. K’yarn had pulled his pistol out already in case anything dangerous came out which I was a little surprised by considering how much of a pacifist he’d always been when he could avoid it. It made me a little worried for him; what if this mission somehow broke him? I wish he didn’t have to deal with any of this. But as long as he did, I wanted to help protect him from it.

I started using my hold on his hand to pull him behind me just in case anything actually did come out of the puddle that was now bubbling violently with something like groaning coming from the ground itself. It sounded so foreign but… unnervingly familiar like I’d heard something similar to it before. Then something started to rise from the puddle.

It started as something rounded and smooth like an upside-down bowl, purely white and textured like bone; textured like xindrait bone, more specifically. K’yarn poked his head over my shoulder as I pulled my rifle back out, fully expecting a fight with another feral in a few seconds. But no tentacles emerged from the goo, just a set of long, slender arms that began to pull the creature’s body from the abyss.

The thing was nothing I’d seen yet on Oja. It seemed to not just emerge from the puddle, but actually form from it, like the amount that bubbled up was just enough to create it as it faded away the more it rose up. Yet it came out wearing tattered remains of fabric that were stained black and did little to hide some terrifying features that seemed perfectly designed to kill us like everything else on this moon.

It was anthropoid, uncomfortably so, in fact. Almost like a xindrait but it didn’t share the triangular-shaped facial plate, nor did it have some jagged and animalistic covering like the ferals. This was almost a dome, shaped perfectly to fit the head like a helmet would, except it was obviously ingrained in the creature’s flesh as a mutation of some sort. And on top of that, the creature was intimidating. It had to be well over ten feet tall, making K’yarn and I have to crane our heads upwards to look at it.

“You have hurt its children,” the thing spoke in a disturbingly deep and altered voice. “The All-Seer will ensure you feel our pain.”

“No, it can’t be,” K’yarn paused, stepping to my side and raising his pistol. “Brilxox?”

The thing’s head looked down at us, its head twitching as it studied us. If this thing was Brilxox… by the spirits, there was no doubt he was infected now, he barely even looked like a xindrait anymore. It took a step towards us, a clawed foot protruding from the tattered robes as it did so.

“The final confrontation, I think we all expected it to end like this,” it grumbled at us. “You’ve lost. You know that, don’t you? In just a few short hours, the Great Compleation will be complete and Amarium will belong to the All-Seer!”

“The Great Compleation?” K’yarneth questioned through gritted teeth, keeping his pistol pointed at the domed skull. “Because of you, over a billion of our people are dead!”

“The weak will fall, the strong survive and shall change to become perfect like us. You, K’yarneth Zhurkin, are not weak. You will make a fine member of the new Amarium,” he growled, now suddenly turning his head to me. “And you, Turian, your dreadful Initiative will be next.”

“We’ve gotten pretty good at killing your kind, actually,” I yelled out to him as I eyed his visible body for any possible soft spots to fire at before he started attacking us.

“I’m doing what’s best for Amarium! We are weak, just a bunch of creatures with no way to protect ourselves other than sound cannons? We need the extra strength and the mutations of the Fer’yasai-”

“Aren’t worth it,” K’yarn interrupted harshly. “You’re no savior, Brilxox. You’re a traitor to your entire species and have been for centuries. You’ll pay for your genocide if it’s the last thing we do.”

“Killing me stops nothing. You cannot win, Zhurkin.”

“If there can be no victory… then I’ll fight forever so you can’t either.”

The creature--or I suppose I should acknowledge that it’s Brilxox now--let out a grimacing groan from behind the bony helmet, his arms reaching through holes in his robing to loosen the band at the top keeping it on him. The tattered fabric fell to the ground lightly and revealed the harsh truth of what the Fer’yasai infection had done to his body.

Not only was his body significantly taller, but the extra torso space made room for another pair of arms to grow in, terrifying considering xindraits already had four and all of his looked more muscular than even those weird bodybuilding humans from the Milky Way. Even more intimidating was the fact that all of his hands were transformed into blackened claws that dripped the black goo, making me think even a single hit from them could spread the infection to K’yarneth… maybe even to me, we still didn’t fully understand the process.

His legs had lost their plantigrade structure, now adapted to digitigrade standards like my own which meant he was gonna be faster than us, even more so than the already ridiculous height advantage gave him. And based on his multitude of long-fingered claw hands, I would be willing to bet he could crawl around on the ground in a horrifying display if he wanted to close some distance even quicker.

As if that all wasn’t enough on offense, his defensive side seemed even more capable. It seemed like every inch of him was covered in more bony plating that meant standard gunfire was essentially useless. Even the flashbangs I made couldn’t burst through all that, so I had little to no idea how we could even hurt him in the slightest.

“Rudimentary creatures of imperfect flesh and blood,” he sighed out, changing his stance lower to the ground as if he were ready to pounce, “there is a realm of existence so far beyond your own you cannot even imagine it. We are beyond your comprehension.” Four tentacles slipped out from his back, looking just as protected by bone plating as the rest of his body.

“You’re going to die here today, Brilxox!” K’yarn yelled out in anger. “And then that ‘All-Seer’ will personally be getting my Ambassadorial boot shoved up his ass.”

“Your words are as empty as your future,” he said coldly, a raspy growl filling his throat as his tentacles writhed in the air. “I am the vanguard of your destruction. This exchange is over.”


	11. Fallen Council

We all stood still for a moment yet it seemed like an eternity of waiting for someone else to make a move. With no visible weakness in his armor, I was still trying to figure out what attacks could even phase him in the slightest. K’yarn looked like he was thinking the same thing or else he would’ve started blasting away already.

All four of Brilxox’s tentacles moved slowly like they had minds of their own, each one pointing at us for a few seconds before switching over to the other. They were also much longer than I’d seen K’yarn’s or any other xindraits, having to be well over double the size of his already impressive height.

He made an odd clicking noise and turned his head towards me in a way that sent a chill up my spine. Then one of his tentacles shot towards me so fast that I barely had time to dodge the point of it. He threw the first attack and was already trying to go for a kill shot; I didn’t know whether to be afraid or honored that he thought I was enough of a threat to need to be taken care of so quickly. But dodging it wasn’t the end of the assault because then it curled back around and started coiling around my arms and chest, restraining me tightly before I could even react.

The coil tightened more than I expected, putting a sudden and extreme amount of pressure around me that almost made it hard to breathe. I heard a few pops and cracks that didn’t hurt me so I knew it must’ve been the pure muscle of the tentacle actually starting to break away at my armor which I had already made extra enforced after the thresher maws on Akuze just in case. I still had my hand on my rifle, but I physically couldn’t move my arms to try and shoot him and he knew it.

K’yarn acted as quickly as he could, pointing his pistol at Brilxox and landing a shot right on his face. The only thing to come from it was smoke and a crack across his facial plating that I could barely see and I actually had eyes. The mutated xindrait grunted under his plating, turning his head to K’yarneth as I felt the tentacle around me tense, then flung me off to the side with an unimaginable amount of force.

Using my biotics, I was able to slow myself down just before I hit a dead tree sternum-first that knocked the breath out of me once I finally hit the ground. I landed on the crest of the hill I originally climbed up on, rolling down it until I was able to plant my feet into the grey matter and get a decent grip of the tendril-like substance.

I coughed as my lungs tried to get another breath in, struggling to my hands and knees as my torso felt sore from getting crushed and then slammed through a tree. I held onto my ribs with my left arm over my armor, groaning as my body ached at the touch. But even over my own whiny noises, I could hear the lake behind me still bubbling and churning as ferociously as it was before Brilxox came from the ground.

I looked and it was almost like it was boiling, yet there weren't any signs of it actually being heated like smoke or steam. The motions didn’t make any sense… unless there was something big moving beneath the surface which I almost expected at this point. But I didn’t want to be anywhere near here if anything came out, so I started crawling back up the side of the hill to try and get back to K’yarneth and help him take down Brilxox.

My sight at the hillcrest was of K’yarn being thoroughly outmatched by his mutated counterpart. K’yarn was a decent-enough fighter after I’d helped to train him for missions, but going one-on-one with a seemingly unstoppable creature wasn’t exactly his forte, especially not after still probably being exhausted from running and not being able to get anything done except for dodging a few slashes and strikes.

Luckily, my rifle was still in my hands because we learned in turian bootcamp to never lose your weapon, meaning I had some iron grip that only took about three decades of my life to finally come in handy now. I used the raised ground as a space to set the gun on and take aim, looking down my scope just in time to see K’yarneth being lifted and slammed into the ground by Brilxox’s tentacles. Thank the spirits for the xindrait healing factor, but that still had to hurt and he looked near motionless on the ground.

Brilxox’s tentacle tips pointed at K’yarneth on the ground, immediately reminding me of how Ait has said she was infected after being hit by one of them; and that was before he had even mutated to this level, there’s no telling how fast or powerful the infection would be now. Now wasn’t a time for careful fire, I just needed to get him off of K’yarneth as quickly as possible.

I fired wildly at his facial plating, the rifle’s burst fire rather accurate even from this distance. My hope was that we could weaken the cracked plating just enough to get it opened up, then it’d be a matter of a few shots before he was down. But K’yarneth’s gun had explosive rounds and it barely cracked, and my rifle shots weren’t faring much better. But my plan to distract him worked, him turning his head towards me in annoyance as K’yarn slowly rolled away on his side to catch his breath.

Despite his lack of eyes--or a face at all--I could feel his stare piercing my soul. He raised his arms slowly, muscles trembling like he was struggling to pull something up without any actual objects there to resist him. I was distracted and loosened my grip on my rifle but I could hear something new, a sudden splash behind me of something in the lake, and I immediately felt something grab onto my left leg.

I was dragged down the hill and towards the lake. I managed to roll onto my back to try and plant my hands and loose foot into the ground, only barely working as I saw what was attached to me. It looked like another tentacle--an appendage I was getting really sick of seeing in this galaxy by now--coming straight from the opaque slime.

My first instinct was to try and shoot it, but it had little effect other than an even tighter grip that cracked away at my shin armor. I needed to help K’yarneth, not get drowned in a lake of slime and doom an entire species in the process. I needed something big, something with enough of a pop to get me free.

Then the thought came to my mind: the flashbangs I customized earlier in the day before we even started to head out! I only had three of them to spare, but I think this moment of desperation warranted the use of one. I reached into my hip pouch, my body now not being more than ten feet or so from the lake’s edge. I found myself mentally praying to the spirits that this would work as I pulled the pin from the top of one grenade, then tossed it into the gunk right behind the tentacle. I did my best to hastily put up a biotic barrier around at least my head so I wouldn’t be temporarily blind and deaf once the thing went off this close to me.

The plan worked well enough; the bang splashed the slime into the air and a pained shrieking sound came from either the tentacle or the lake itself, the thing now finally loosening its grip on me before retreating back under the surface to heal as the pop was enough to nearly blow it in two at the source.

The part of the lake where the stun grenade went off was actually steaming now from the heat of the explosion, bubbling with thermal energy instead of spontaneous churning as I got back to my feet and scampered up the hill for the third time. As much as I wanted to get away from the lake, it still offered the best position to aim from, especially for my last-ditch effort of a packed punch to deliver straight at Brilxox before he finished with K’yarneth.

I planned on using a charged shot earlier but didn’t have the time. K’yarneth was just barely able to fight back against the mutated councilman, still more or less just dodging tiredly as six arms and four tentacles made for a lot of targets to watch out for. I switched my rifle in single-fire mode, fully prepared to charge the shot up as much as I could and at least open up a weak spot to exploit.

The rifle barrel was starting to heat up after a few seconds, the metal beginning to turn red as the air around it waved with hot air. The heat sink in the ammo slot was whirring while I kept my scope’s sight lined up with Brilxox, watching angrily as he slammed K’yarneth to the ground once more.

My saving grace at the moment was being unknown; I think Brilxox assumed I was still held up or that I was currently drowning, neither of which was true for my sake. I could feel my mandibles twitching as my nerves rode high with a lot of feelings: fear, anger, but the most present was anxiety; this absolutely had to work or else we were essentially out of all other options to get out.

The heat sink of my rifle dinged as it reached a full charge, meaning I had just a few seconds to release it before it vented itself to avoid a literal spontaneous explosion. I put every bit of breath I had into a whistle to draw the bastard’s attention. He looked up and tried to read the area. Despite his lack of eyes, his body language was enough to tell me he was surprised I was still alive, but I had another surprise just for him.

My finger tensed along with every other muscle in my body, the split-second feeling like a sudden eternity as I released the trigger. The shot blasted out with enough kickback to nearly knock my shoulder plate off, the energy blast sailing through the air like a streak of lightning and a roar following behind it.

Through the scope, the view of Brilxox’s face was replaced entirely by smoke. I could hear him roar in either pain or frustration, hopefully the former instead of the ladder. Regardless of how he was handling the shot, the moment to launch a full assault was now; no mercy, no matter the cost.

I stood and ran to the two of them, popping the emptied heat sink and slid a fresh one into the slot as I moved. But while I was reloading, I noticed and remembered the fun little feature K’yarn’s dad had put onto my rifle before we left the planet: the Soti sound cannon attachment. If the beacon wasn’t enough to penetrate his armor or at least affect him, then maybe a concentrated shot or two could put him out of commission for us.

By the time I got to them. Brilxox was still writhing and had his face covered with his hands. K’yarn was coughing as he struggled to finally get air back in his lungs without Brilxox’s hands around his throat. The infected xindrait slowly uncovered his face finally. I didn’t even waste the second to look at him again, I activated the Soti attachment and heard something like bass ring through the air and towards Brilxox, hitting him and causing him to jump back and off of K’yarn with an animalistic shriek of pain.

Brilxox’s tentacles whipped around furiously as I rushed to K’yarn’s side. He was breathing heavily and trembling, obviously needing a little bit for his healing to really kick in before he could start moving around again. Brilxox was in much the same predicament, still writhing in pain. But right then, at that moment, seeing how badly K’yarn was hurt, knowing how much damage this old… kifu had done, my emotions were finally starting to get the better of me.

I could feel a sudden adrenaline rush, my arms started glowing faintly of blue and it brought me back to the days before I had my implant and my powers would get set off every time I felt anything but perfectly calm. I wanted to get some payback; I needed to get some payback, for my own sanity and to make all of this feel somewhat worth the trip.

I caressed the side of K’yarn’s face before standing back up, leaving my rifle on the ground and letting my biotics flare fully as I psyched myself up to show Brilxox what a turian can really do to some mutated, geriatric politician.

With his senses still numbed from the Soti shot, I was able to easily step beside him. I stomped a foot onto his back plating squarely between the spots where his tentacles were jutting out from. Then I grabbed onto the bony limb right at the base of them and started to pull at them like pesky weeds from the ground.

As strong as his armor was, not even steel could take the force of an L5n Biotic like me. It took just one strong, lifting pull--accompanied by animal-like shrieks from the councilman--and he was officially relieved of his extra back appendages once and for all. I tossed them off to the side and watched as they melted into the grey matter of the ground, turning into the same black slime that made up the lake.

In my moment of fixation, Brilxox arched his back and tossed me off of him with a roll. He skittered on all fours to face me with an attempt at intimidation, but the now wide-open and bleeding sections of his back and face made it more obvious than ever that not only could he be hurt, he could actually be taken down for good.

Brilxox stood back on his feet and growled, the damage to his face being easily noticeable now. Whether it was from the sniper shot or the infection, I couldn’t tell, but the man was devoid of his eyes now and had the signature mouthful of needle-like teeth. Ironic, considering K’yarn said how highly the councilman saw himself because of his lack of the faceplate mutation.

“Almost forty years of my life so far,” I blurted, cracking my knuckles in my palms as Brilxox readied his stance for another attack, “and kicking your ass is gonna be my proudest accomplishment yet.”

He lunged first with a flurry of slashes with his clawed hands. But with my biotics as fired up as they were, it almost felt like time was slowed down just enough for me to not be caught off guard by any of the strikes. I blocked his first slash with a solid punch directly into his hand, nearly disintegrating it in the process while I was left completely unscathed. The same happened with each of his other hands as he continued his assault and did nothing but dig himself further into his own hole.

Once I had managed to blow through all six of them, it looked like he finally realized how much trouble he was in. Landing a few consecutive shots directly to his chest popped open a piece of his plating, making him even more vulnerable. I wasted no time before charging a decent biotic blast in my palms, then running at Brilxox and sliding down to knock them into his legs. With another screech and the wet sound of alien meat being disintegrated, Brilxox was face-down on the ground once more, this time without any of the appendages that even made him a threat to us.

I grabbed onto him by the ridge of the bone plating on his neck and took a quick look around. Much as he’d tossed me through a tree in an attempt to kill me, there was a stump of another dead tree nearby with the old wood forming a jagged edge that gave me an idea. I dragged him towards it as he wrestled to try and escape from me. But without anything but cauterized stumps, his attempts were completely useless.

Pulling Brilxox’s torso onto my shoulder while he continued to screech and wiggle around, I positioned myself right beside the stump. Then I dropped, using my momentum to slam Brilxox down onto the wood through the vulnerable areas opened up in his back and chest, making it easy to pierce with a little help from biotic force.

I expected a shriek, some grunt or groan of pain, but he fell almost completely silent instead. Motionless, near lifeless, I could barely hear him starting to choke and gurgle on his own blood. Xindraits could heal but this… this was a death blow that not even a Fer’yasai mutation could heal in time to save him.

My biotics started to die down as my mind filled itself with thoughts of my successful attempt at revenge. I crawled over beside Brilxox’s head and watched as the remnants of his face left started to lose their reddish hue, falling into greyer shades. Then the sound of movement nearby caught my attention.

“Ventrus-” K’yarn managed to cough out as he finally got back to his knees, causing me to awkwardly and quickly edge over to him on my knees to help him stabilize. “I wanna see him,” he stammered.

I let him put an arm around my shoulder so I could help him inch closer to Brilxox. I set him down on the right of him and I stood behind him, eyeing the landscape to make sure we wouldn’t have any more surprise visitors trying to attack us. I could see the lake still raging, leaving me with an unsettling feeling in the pit of my stomach.

“You look absolutely pathetic,” K’yarn managed to chuckle out as he looked down at Brilxox. “I have to say, the lack of a face really fits you considering how you spent the last millennia thinking you were better than the rest of your own species.”

“You laugh now, predictable,” he choked, his voice just as sinister and raspy without the covering there to distort his voice at all. “You will see the All-Seer’s glory, I promise you. All will be one under-”

“That’s the difference between me and you as politicians, Brilxox: I actually keep my promises. And I made a very important one back on Amarium.” K’yarn pulled his pistol back out from his hip and jammed the barrel into Brilxox’s jaw. “Ventrus, a little barrier, please?”

“Huh?” I asked, confused, before realizing what he wanted to do. I set up a small, thin barrier in front of us, leaving only his arm exposed so that we couldn’t get caught with any sort of… splash.

“Brilxox Scuziek, on behalf of every single citizen still left alive on Amarium as well as every one dead because of you,” he paused, placing his finger on the trigger and keeping it steady, “you’re officially relieved from your duties as Councilman of the ACT.”

K’yarn finally pulled the trigger, a bright burst of blue energy mixing with a ripple of black as the shot turned Brilxox’s head into a bowl of black soup due to the plating not being damaged as much by his gun. But the ex-councilman’s body went fully limp now, the silence from him meaning we’d finally done what we came here to: make him pay.

I reached my hand down to help pick K’yarneth up as I dropped the barrier. He took my hand and nearly fell into me but was finally back on his feet, even if he was having to lean on me a bit. He put his gun back into his holster and sighed as we walked back over so I could pick up my rifle.

“I only have two shots left,” he mumbled to me.

“I still have plenty more thermal clips for my rifle in case we run into any more trouble,” I told him with reassurance as I grabbed my rifle from the ground and put it on my back. “Plus two more flashbangs if things get dire.”

He went quiet for a second before tensing up and grabbing onto my chest tightly, “Ventrus, the beacon!”

I didn’t know what he’d meant at first until I remembered that I tucked the beacon into my chest armor… right where Brilxox had tried to crush me. I rustled inside the hidden notch until I felt the device and pulled it out, the thing thankfully looking mostly fine except for a few small cracks on the screen. It was still putting out a neutralizing signal and was showing us an adaptive display, but there was something wrong with the view.

“What’s wrong? Is it broken?” K’yarn asked, obviously seeing the concern on my face.

“No, I- I don’t know. It’s showing a signal nearby. One growing… incredibly fast.”

“A signal? From where?”

As soon as he asked, we both slowly turned our head to the lake, churning as much as ever. The ground trembled once slightly, then again with a small bit more force. Then a third time with enough force to nearly throw us off of our feet entirely. I tucked the beacon away again and helped K’yarn to his feet. We both knew one thing for sure, and that was that we needed to get out of here as fast as we could.

Brilxox’s body began melting into the ground like his discarded tentacles had, liquefying before my eyes just as K’yarn and I broke into a dead sprint away from the lake. The crunchy, hollow footsteps on the grey matter that I was getting used to were now more slushy sounding, causing me to look down and notice that the black slime was starting to seep out of the ground across the entire plain.

After we covered a good bit of ground, K’yarneth tripped and nearly fell face-first into a puddle. Luckily I was able to turn and catch him just in time, the both of us panting frantically with a mixture of fear and exhaustion.

A loud roar reverberated through the air, centralizing from the lake itself. Even from here, I could see something new happening within the pool, dozens more tentacles like the ones that grabbed me were slipping out onto the surface, proving themselves much longer than I could’ve imagined. Then several more came out, these one much, much thicker and much, much longer. I’d seen turian fighters with less width and these things looked like pure muscle in the color of standard xindrait flesh.

The two of us were able to stand but I found myself frozen in terror as two unimaginably large appendages burst out from the center of the lake. I thought they were more tentacles until the slime ran off of them, revealing long fingers attached to a palm that was slowly splitting down to what looked like the elbow. The hands came crashing into the ground and began pulling up something even larger, covered in the black goop but easily discernible as massive in size.

The tentacles alone were bigger than even the thresher maws I had to face on Akuze back in the Milky Way. And the way they moved in unison to pull this mystery being from the depths, I couldn’t even begin to fathom how big the creature could be once it was fully on land. It took K’yarn tugging on my arm to distract me from it and get me running beside him once again,

Even though we were running as fast as we could, the lake seemed to be expanding behind us and swallowing the ground with it. We only had so much land left to cover before hitting a wall; a cliff face, more specifically. Too steep to climb quickly and literally breaking apart in chunks as the ground shook and crumbling at each spot we tried to grab.

I could’ve tried to use my biotics to lift us out of there, but they were more suitable for slowing a fall, not shooting me and another person upwards. Especially not after using my powers most of the day so far; I was beyond drained to the point of collapse. And K’yarneth looked just as bad, having to have had to run across half the moon to save his own life and his body working overtime to heal itself from Brilxox’s attack.

We both backed into the wall and grabbed onto each other’s hands, watching as the giant creature continued to grow out of the sludge and reveal more and more of its body. It had a bony face similar to Brilxox’s but with tusk-like structures that made it even more intimidating than its size already did. It looked more xindrait than feral with more flesh than bone armor, but I had to assume that being that size meant the extra armor wasn’t exactly necessary.

“Ventrus-” K’yarn called to me as the sludge started to rise up at our feet. Pulled me so we could face each other, gently petting my mandibles since he knew it always worked like magic when he did it. “I love you,” he said, sounding almost defeated.

I held the side of his face in my palm, taking the chance to focus on him and solely him for what seemed like the first time since we got here. I leaned in and kissed him, my mandibles tensing as the quaking of the ground got stronger.

“I love you too, K’yarneth,” I reassured him as our lips parted, pulling him into my body while glancing over at impending dread racing toward us by the second.

I thought I felt K’yarn wrapping his arms around my waist tightly… but both of his arms were holding onto my neck. I pushed off of him gently to look down and noticed that there was another tentacle wrapped around me from behind, as well as one around K’yarn. We looked at each in surprise and were suddenly pulled upward just as the last bit of the ground beneath us liquefied.

Much to both of our embarrassment--not like it actually mattered at the moment-- we were screaming out of the unknown sense of what was pulling us up as it became clear that these tentacles were coming from something above the cliff. I thought it could be something related to the giant creature, but I feel like just letting us fall into the expanded lake would’ve been much easier than toying with us, if it was even capable of doing so.

Once we were at the top of the cliff, only about twenty or thirty feet up from where we were, the tentacles placed us gently on the ground. K’yarneth and I went for our weapons at the same time, pointing them at the feral.

“That’s… that’s the same one that chased me off the canyon!” he yelled out with a new sense of fierce determination despite his hard pants of exhaustion.

The creature was absolutely horrifying to look at but had more hittable spots than Brilxox, that was for sure. I was ready to start firing before K’yarneth, but then it suddenly… laid down in front of us. K’yarn looked just as confused as I did as the thing suddenly went from ferocious beast to domesticated animal like it was nothing.

A figure popped up from its back, hooded but looking rather normal compared to everything else on the moon so far. They stroked the feral’s facial plating like a house pet and the thing let out an affirmative grunt as if it liked it. The figure slid off the back of the feral and approached us slowly. That was when I realized; the robing, the height, the gentle way of moving about, and most importantly the apparent control over the feral.

“Ait-amma?” K’yarn asked out loud before I could, slowly lowering his weapon as he did so.

The figure stopped and I could hear a muffled sigh from beneath the shadow of the hood. They moved their hands up to the hood, claws in place of their fingers that were blackened. Once their hood was pulled back, the cloth covering the lower part of their face making it clear that it was for sure Ait-amma, just with a few more signs of the infection since I last saw her a few hours ago.

Aside from the claws that had begun developing, her facial plating was starting to gain the same dome-like structure around the back like Brilxox had. And her robing looked slightly tighter in the arms, almost as if she was gaining extra muscle because of the transformation, or she could’ve been in the process of growing another set of arms as well.

The titan behind us let out a horrendous roar, making the ground quake with just pure sound itself. I could see how massive it truly was now; it was easily the biggest creature I’d ever seen that was organic. And the fact that it was just waiting underground to be awakened like that… could it be what I thought it was?

“K’yarneth, Ventrus,” Ait spoke to us, her voice obviously even more heavily affected by the mutation as her normal pitch faded and was replaced with a deeper one nothing like her own, “we have to go, now.” She reached her hand towards us while using her other to continue petting the fusion feral to her side. “The All-Seer… is alive.”


	12. Sibling Schemes

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the first chapter back in K'yarneth's POV! It'll remain this way for the rest of the story, so no need to worry about changing views again

Ventrus looked uneasy still, glancing at me and back to Ait like he was waiting for my cue to trust her or not. She looked different for sure, but the softness of her voice hidden behind the newer grit still rang through to me clearly. As absolutely crazy as it was, believing she was trying to help us despite the obvious signs of her infection spreading was about the most sensical decision of the day on my part.

I put my pistol away in its holster and wasted no time taking her hand. She and I both looked to Ventrus who followed my lead, putting his rifle away and coming to my side like a loyal soldier.

“We’re riding this big guy far away,” Ait said like it was something normal to do.

“Black lakes of death, giant tentacle monsters, and now transportation by Fer’yasai,” Ven griped out loud, “what’s next? Are we gonna just blow up the moon and call it a Wednesday?”

“The humor was missed, Ventrus, but now isn’t the time.”

“Right. All right, let’s get on this big tentacle horse then, I’m ready.”

Ait-aama hopped on first, straddling the back of the creature just behind its head. She reached her hand down and helped me up behind her, then I helped an exhausted Ventrus get up behind me. He wrapped his arms around my waist and leaned against me heavily like he was afraid to fall off which was almost adorable. Meanwhile, I held onto a ridge of the Fer’yasai’s back plating, making a great makeshift handle as the beast stood on its unnerving amount of arms and scurried off into the forest that resumed in the distance.

Even though we were running away, the looming threat that the All-Seer posed was evident by the quickly-spreading corruption of the grey matter, following close behind us for a while until the fusion beast’s speed picked up and we began to outrun it. But no matter how far we could get, I knew that it was just delaying the inevitable fact that our mission had a new deadline and it was rapidly approaching.

The All-Seer roared in the background. I couldn’t exactly translate feral noises into my language, but I could imagine that it wasn’t happy to notice us getting away again. If Brilxox could’ve served as any sort of spy, then the titan could’ve known we were essentially the last people standing between it and taking over all of Amarium and potentially the rest of the explorable universe if they could get more intelligent agents like Brilxox served as.

Despite the immeasurable amount of chaos behind us, the fusion was unfazed and was skillfully running between trees and shrubbery as it brought us deeper and deeper into the seemingly endless forest landscape. Everything around us looked unaffected by the spreading corruption which was a welcome sight; it was almost peaceful considering how the past few hours had felt like a nonstop struggle for our lives.

One of Ven’s arms let go of me and I heard a rustling sound as he fished around in his armor for the beacon again. It took him a little bit to actually get a decent look at it considering we were bobbing and weaving through the trees, but he eventually managed to read it and shove it back away before clinging onto me again.

“We’ve covered an insane amount of distance,” he said, slightly muffled with his face in my shoulder. “The All-Seer’s signal isn’t even close enough to be registered anymore!”

“He’ll be rapidly approaching soon enough,” Ait called back. “It’ll need to build its strength before it starts moving around, but then they’ll get here before we know it.”

As gloomy as it sounded, it was the dangerous truth. If the corruption didn’t destroy the surface of the moon before we could get off of it then the All-Seer would either send a horde of Fer’yasai after us or take us out itself. We just had to think of a way to keep either scenario from happening which was, as always, much easier said than done.

After a couple more minutes of riding, the fusion noticeably slowed down and we barreled through a wall of foliage. We were now in a clearing, similar to the one we crash-landed in when we first arrived on the planet. But this one was a lot more beautiful, almost like a natural garden as the ground was covered in flowers and the plant wall that surrounded it blended perfectly into the trees. It felt secluded but in a comforting way.

Ait-aama slid off the back of the fusion first, then helped me and Ventrus off next. It was refreshing to have our feet on firm ground again. We slowly followed her as she walked to the middle of the clearing. She faced away from us to pull down her mouth covering to whistle, likely not wanting us to see her face still. But when she finished her whistle, more rustling from the walls around the clearing made Ventrus and I go back to back instinctively.

Dozens more Fer’yasai emerged from the branches and leaves. They were all different shapes, sizes, and lengths but all shared one thing in common: the skull plating that made them immune to the beacon. Ait was smart enough to know we’d be in panic mode as she came over and grabbed us both to talk to us.

“They’re all perfectly safe, I promise,” she said calmly. “They’re pacified because of me and that beacon you guys kept.”

“Pacified?” Ventrus asked as his eyes darted around. “Last time we were swarmed like this, we had to shoot our way out of it. Why are these ones different?”

She guided us both back to the center of the clearing as she continued, “The Fer’yasai aren’t feral animals. They’re still the people that were left here all that time ago!”

“Wait,” I stopped her, “that doesn’t make any sense. Why would they attack us if they’re just ‘normal’ then?”

“Because all they knew was that we were the species that left them here to die and that Ventrus was some alien that had no problem killing their kind. And I have my own theory about the All-Seer; I think that he has some sort of control over their minds to an extent which is why they were so relentless.”

“Like I told you before Ven, she was able to calm one down for a while earlier…so does that mean you can actually talk to these things?”

“To an extent at first, but much easier now. It’s almost like I can hear their thoughts- but they aren’t the only ones I can hear, K’yarneth. The All-Seer’s voice is overpowering, even I almost fell to it before…”

“Before what, Ait?”

“Before I tracked your signal like it’ll plan to. That beacon is just strong enough to drown the All-Seer out, it gives me and all the Fer’yasai our minds back as long as we’re close to it.”

“So are we like, actually safe here,” Ven mumbled as he uneasily continued to look around.

“Of course, I was able to convince this horde we were the good guys. They’ll keep us safe as long as the beacon is still going.”

Ven visibly relaxed but stuck close to my side, his hand reaching over and interlocking with mine for his own comfort and mine. The three of us sat down in the middle of the clearing together, Ait and I going to our knees while Ventrus squatted down and not-so-elegantly fell on his behind with a soft thud against the grass.

“Speaking of safety,” she continued on our conversation, “I think I know why that beacon is able to ‘free’ all of the Fer’yasai.”

“If you say something about the power of friendship, I’m gonna scream,” Ven huffed as a smaller Fer’yasai brushed by him to sit next to Ait-aama.

“No, Ventrus, this isn’t just some children’s book,” Ait retorted, waving him off for a second before clearing her throat to resume. “I think your beacon scrambles the All-Seer’s signal. And since these Fer’yasai are immune to the beacon itself, they get a clear head for the first time in...well, stars know how long.”

“Can we use that to our advantage?” I couldn’t help but ask. “It couldn’t hurt to have an army of friendly Fer’yasai to use against the All-Seer himself, could it?”

“We’re- they’re all prepared to fight with you two. Once we get an actual plan laid out, I can help instruct them and hopefully we can put together some sort of final stand to help save Amarium.”

Ventrus let out a loud, drawn-out yawn before looking between us and apologizing for possibly seeming rude, blaming the fact that he was beyond tired after the long day we’d all had. Sometimes I forget that using his powers drains his energy, and him going all out back there against Brilxox must’ve taken a lot out of him.

“You’re free to rest while we plan, Ventrus,” Ait offered to him. “The corruption has hours before it reaches us and the All-Seer won’t start heading here himself until it deems it truly necessary to do so. Plus...I think you’ve earned a decent nap after saving my brother yet again.”

“I don’t know,” he hesitated. “Are you sure you guys don’t need me? I know a thing or two about battle plans-”

“We can discuss it when you wake up,” Ait cut him off as she gestured for the smaller Fer’yasai beside her to stand beside Ven. “Until then, we’ll get some land layout set up for you. You’ll need to know the area if you want to plot an attack. And some decent sleep if you want the energy to actually win the fight. So please follow the little one; he’ll take you to a cozy spot. I’m sure somewhere quiet and nearby so we bother you too much.”

Ven stood up slowly, bumping his forehead against mine as he did so. He uneasily followed the creature and looked back at me every couple of steps, but soon enough he was tucked away through the shrubbery wall and out of my range of vision. All I could hope for now was that he could get every last bit of energy back we could because I felt like we were gonna need more than ever in the extremely near future.

My omni-tool pinged suddenly and I checked the alert, seeing a sudden influx of files sent from Ventrus himself along with a little message: “Maybe you two can make literally any sense of this stuff- forget to send it to you while we were running for our lives.”

Even on Amarium, we had our own versions of what the Andromeda aliens called omni-tools. Only ours were circular disk devices instead of actual implants in our forearms. Only members of our government and other high-ranking officials were permitted to carry them, including Ait, so I sent her copies of the files so she could look over them herself with me.

“You in the mood for a little reading, Ait?”

“And here I thought that the end of the world would get me out of reading government papers for a day or two.”

“Ait-”

“Yeah yeah, I know. Maybe we can find something juicy in all this stuff. The most gossip I’ve heard in the past few days has been...well, Brilxox being a traitor, but that seems a little mainstream by now.”

I sighed aloud while the Fer’yasai in the area walked around like it was nothing. It reminded me of the normal citizens of Amarium just freely strolling the streets of the various city blocks. These creatures were anything but normal, but they all seemed to move and interact with one another like any two xindraits would in their daily lives. I didn’t know what we could possibly do to help them, even if we won, but it was saddening to know they were just as trapped here as we were.

“This Renata Shin’koh lady seems pretty important,” Ait said, pulling me back into the moment with her. “Her name’s on almost everything here- she coulda been the leader of the group, maybe?”

“Shin’koh?” I said out loud, pondering over the familiarity of the name. “I’d completely forgotten about her! Yeah, she led the team that was sent to investigate Oja along with Brilxox.”

“What happened to them?”

“According to Brilxox, they all died and he was the sole survivor. But if he’s been a puppet ever since that day...I don’t want to think about what he could’ve done to them. They were all specialists, Renata being our old scholar. She was supposed to chronicle everything for the Council,” I drifted off, glancing over the number of files that she and her team were able to still write out despite their situation. “She used to be friends with Mom too before she disappeared.”

“What are the odds we happen to get our hands on information from probably the only group of people that actually knew what was going on when this all started?” she asked while searching through some of the first files on the list. “Hey, this one’s locked or something.”

“A locked file? She shouldn’t have needed to do that,” I said, snatching her echodisc to look at the file while she had it pulled up. “These were meant to come right to the Council, she shouldn’t have needed to lock anything unless it was private…” I thought for a minute before handing her back her disc, “Just ignore it for now, I guess. She should have more to help us in the rest of her reports. Plus I have a friend in Andromeda that could probably crack it for me no problem.”

“Whatever you say,” she answered dryly. “I’m sure your friend’s help is gonna do a lot for us if we can’t even escape the moon, let alone our own galaxy.”

“Think positives, Ait!”

“There’s a literal titan trying to eliminate our species, I’m turning into a Fer’yasai, and a beacon is the only thing keeping you two from immediate death.”

“Yeah, but...we have snacks in the pack we brought with us. That’s a plus, right?”

“K’yarneth-”

“Fine, fine, let’s just power through these while Ventrus is asleep. From what I knew about Renata, I doubt she would’ve gone down without giving any possible future victims a chance to survive.”

We continued to search through the massive amount of paperwork, finding more and more currently useless information. Plantlife readings, studies of the Fer’yasai that had stuff we already knew, just seeming like hundreds of pages of filler content. But then I stumbled across one with an actual title instead of a general file number: “CN: BEHEMOTH”. I scooted beside Ait to let her share my screen with me to read together.

“This looks like a lot of scientific junk we can’t do too much with, K’yarn,” Ait told me with a hint of disappointment in her voice.

“No, there’s something here about the anatomy...could they have actually seen the thing while they were here?”

“I mean, it’s possible. The big guy had to put a lot in motion to make sure he could use Brilxox, I wouldn’t be surprised if it wanted to oversee everything itself.”

“Look, this part actually mentions the faceplating! It’s...completely impenetrable.”

“No, there’s something right here about the plates being adjustable! Wait, adjustable?”

“So the plates can move? Great, let’s just wait for it to open wide and then use our toothpick weapons to really ruin its day of conquering.”

The two of us sat quietly while reading over the single file, trying to gather every little morsel of info we could. Everything Renata included sounded promising but was then immediately followed by something showing that our ideas to take it down wouldn’t work. Attack the legs? Impossible because they’re too thick. Wear the body down over time? Impossible because it has healing faster than even that of a xindrait. Whatever we needed to do, it had to be one decisive blow to kill it immediately, otherwise, it would be a wasted attempt.

“She thought maybe it could amplify its signals by doing that,” Ait pointed out in thought. “If we could force it to try and broadcast a large signal, it’d leave the most sensitive part of its body wide open to get hit.”

“But doing that would mean putting you and the Fer’yasai back under his control. And if the message is that strong, it could mess with Ventrus and me too.”

“It’s the only plan we have with the information we have. Until we get more, it’s the best course of action.”

The Fer’yasai we rode on suddenly walked behind us, looking at us before trotting off back to a group of similar ones that were less fused together than it was. But their faces reminded me of the one that was chasing me ever since I slid down the canyon. But then Ventrus was able to help me out. If he hadn’t used his biotics…

“I got it!” I said out loud, causing Ait to jump and every Fer’yasai in the area to turn their head at me disapprovingly.

“Wanna say that any louder? That was an ear-splitter-”

“I know how we can take it down!” I told her excitedly as I grabbed her by the shoulders. “Ventrus was able to use his biotics to hit right through the plating on some of the Fer’yasai, even Brilxox who I couldn’t shoot because his armor was that thick.”

“So...you think Ventrus can punch a hole through the face of the All-Seer? I don’t think he’s that powerful, brother.”

“No...but he might be strong enough to pry the faceplates open! Or even just part of them, anything to give us a space to attack. I just don’t know what we could hit him with once it’s wide open. I’d say Ventrus again, but he’d be having to put everything he had into keeping it open instead of attacking with us.”

She paused for a short while, brainstorming before she spoke again, “What about our ship?”

“It doesn’t have any guns, Ait. Plus we can’t waste the power if we wanna ride it back home to Amarium.”

“No, I mean we could use the ship itself! An explosion like that would be like a close-range gunshot to the All-Seer...if the bullets were a few thousand times bigger and were jet-propelled. And we could use the beacon to call for some kind of extraction team if it works out!”

“And if it doesn’t?”

“Well...then we gave it literally everything we could.”

“But it needs a pilot too, and you’re the only one that knows how to fly it.”

“I can still pilot the thing just fine, K’yarneth. And as long as I can aim the ship right, I can get out of it before it goes down and we can all still get out of here alive and as well as we can be.”

“But if you fall too far-”

“Then I can take a little pain when I hit the ground, I can heal from whatever some dirt can throw at me.”

As much as I wanted to disagree and try to force her to think of something else, she was always the more stubborn one between the two of us. And while the plan sounded beyond drastic, we were beyond desperate enough to match it. But the entirety of this hinged on Ventrus once again having to pull off another miracle for us. He was able to beat Brilxox easily enough but one old man with a few new parts is something entirely different than using his power against a skyscraper.

“I wanna check in on Ventrus,” I finally spoke back. “If he’s gonna be our key guy, he should know about the plan as soon as possible...unless he’s still sleeping. Stars know he needs the beauty sleep now.”

The two of us stood up, taking a breath and enjoying the moment for what it was as we walked towards the area Ventrus was supposed to be sleeping in. As chaotic as our time here had been, I had to admit that most of the scenery was rather beautiful from what I could make of it. I was used to giant cities thanks to Amarium and then colony outposts and the steel architecture inside the Nexus. So being around so much nature was a refreshing change of pace.

“You don’t happen to know any high elevations around here that we could get on, do you? Ventrus is gonna need to get as close to the All-Seer as possible to work his magic.”

“There’s a cliff a short bit away from here, actually,” she answered as we pushed through the wall of vegetation. “I can help you guys get there when we need to. Then I can head the opposite direction to get the ship and hopefully help get us through this.”

We didn’t have to walk before nearly stumbling over Ventrus. He was tucked into a bed of leaves with his head resting on his chest armor which he must’ve detached to use as a pillow for the moment. I could swear he was snoring, even if it was quiet. The man was beyond passed out and he deserved the rest.

Several Fer’yasai formed something like a circle around him as if they were trying to guard him. I sat next to Ventrus on his little leaf pad and lightly petted his forehead crest, causing his head to naturally nuzzle against my palm. The slight purring in his breaths made me crack a smile for seemingly the first time today. Ven’s mandibles twitch and I finished a long stroke over his fringe and turned to Ait who began to speak to me once again.

“You must be exhausted, too, K’yarneth,” she sounded worried. “We have a good while before we have to leave, I wouldn’t blame you for wanting to-”

“No, I’m staying up for this,” I cut her off. “I’ll keep brainstorming how we could make all this work. You just tell your new friends that they need to be ready to fight with us...you can do that, right?”

“More or less, but I can definitely get the emotions across. Just...don’t push yourself too far, K’yarneth. We all need you as much as we need Ventrus.”

“I don’t plan on getting myself killed,” I trailed off while I watched Ven shift slightly on his bedding. “Not when I have so much that I’m trying to stay alive for.”


End file.
